Crazy Train
by baynard
Summary: Some of the more interesting things the crew of the Normandy got up to between a suicide mission and saving the galaxy. The things history tries very hard not to associate with their heroes. Not necessarily from the same timeline.
1. Normandy Harlem Shake

**AN: Hope you guys get a good laugh out of this. I just combed over once or twice myself, so don't be too harsh haha**

The Illusive Man took a deep drag from his cigarette as he continued to browse through the multitude of screens scrolling with a dizzying amount of information. To anyone but perhaps a Salarian, it would be too quick to follow. But the Illusive Man didn't get to where he was by being ordinary. His synthetic eyes cataloged every bit of information that flickered past, scanning through reports and bits of extranet data that had been flagged for his attention.

Battling to keep humanity from being covertly subjugated while trying to discover any information on the collector's was taxing even the Illusive Man's considerable prowess, but he would not rest in his quest to safeguard humanity. This was just a taste of the war to come on the horizons; he would endure and see that humanity would endure as well.

A sudden priority warning bleeped up on one of the bottom screens and he magnified it with a flick of his free hand. There seemed to be a sudden increase in the number of extranet searches utilizing the keyword Normandy. This was not good.

While he had subtly let it be known that the commander was back in action and now playing for team Cerberus, he had let that cat out of the bag on more private channels so that only the higher ups of each species and the council were privy to that knowledge. A sudden 55 million galactic wide surge on the extranet search for the word Normandy in the past 16 hours meant that something might have gone terribly wrong on the commander's mission.

Sucking furiously on his cancer stick, he tilted his glass of Bourbon Whiskey back until it was empty. Repressing the migraine that threatened to overtake him, the Illusive Man scanned through the piles of extranet pilfered information. It seemed that the keywords most popular was "Normandy" paired with "Harlem Shake"

Scrunching his eyebrows, the leader of Cerberus frowned as he tried to piece together what this might mean. Harlem was most likely relating to the 20th century earth cultural revolution that had taken place amongst the African American population of the former United States of America. Shake in context with the word Harlem indicated perhaps a dance of some sort, or maybe even a drink.

Deciding that further pondering would bring forth no new information, the Illusive Man decided to pull up his extranet browser and type in the key phrase to further his investigations. The first link that appeared was a video on the most popular free to upload video site on the extranet, GalaxyNet. The image of the video was unmistakably that of the common area of the Normandy. Already the Illusive Man could feel the migraine winning. Pressing his assistant pager button, he demanded another glass of whiskey which she promptly brought to him.

Standing up, he lit another imported hand rolled cigarette and smoked about half of it before he felt settled enough to continue. Slugging down half the glass of whiskey in preparation, he breathed out evenly through his nose before tapping the video link.

The opening scene was completely silent for a few seconds and in those precious few seconds, the Illusive Man could make out the many forms of the special consultants Shepard had recruited lounging about in the common area. The Turian and Quarian were both leaned up against a wall speaking to each other though no sound could be heard. Specialist Taylor appeared to be using the kitchen to make a meal of some sort while the hooded figure of Katsumi Goto leaned over the counter of the kitchen. The convict was currently rifling through the contents of the opened refrigerator door, amassing a truly epic pile of food onto a platter.

Operative Lawson was seated at the table drinking out of a cup across from the Drell assassin who was drinking out of a darker colored mug. The Asari was seated cross legged on top of the table with her eyes close in a classical lotus position, in deep meditation no doubt. The Salarian doctor appeared to be peering into the garbage disposal unit next to the kitchen with his back turned from the camera while the Krogan and the mercenary Zaeed Massani were seen arm wrestling on the far end of the dining table. There was even the reactivated Geth unit standing at the far end of the screen by itself, seemingly ramrod straight and observing the organics around itself.

For a brief moment, the Illusive Man couldn't help but feel a bit impressed seeing such a multitude of different species lounging about without much incident. It took a real leader to bring together that diverse of a crew and hammer them into a team. That feeling of impression vanished very quickly as the music started.

The dull thump of the bass was a far cry from the Bach and Beethoven he was used to listening to on the rare occasions he had some down time to himself, and certainly the echoing Spanish cry that he could not quite understand wasn't exactly high on his list of songs. But what was most bizarre was the sudden appearance of Commander Shepard.

The man had no shirt or pants on. He was wearing what appeared to be pink underwear and his N7 helmet. The strange half shuffle broken out by periodic bouts of epileptic like hand waving over his head while he shuffled around the common area was easily recognizable as the galaxy famous "Shepard Shuffle" that had hit top trending boards for weeks after his defeat of Saren, a 30 second clip that pilot Moreau had uploaded from one of the Normandy's celebration parties.

The reenactment of that commander's infamous dance was made stranger by the fact that he was practically naked with none of the crew paying attention to him as he shuffled about. The tempo continued to build up as the commander's shuffling became more frantic and erratic with the beat of the song, the last phrase spoken by the singer being looped on repeat in a louder and louder fashion.

Then came the deep bass of another singer's voice who announced to the world, "And Do The Harlem Shake!"

The screen exploded into a frenzy of movement as the beat dropped and the bass began pounding. The Illusive Man could not tear his eyes away from the train wreck in front of him. Somehow the half-naked commander doing the Shepard Shuffle in the background no longer seemed as absurd. It took a few moments for his shattered mind to begin processing what he was seeing, but once he did he nearly dropped his glass of whiskey in disbelief.

Operative Taylor was on the ground lying flat on his stomach without his shirt on but strangely enough wearing a Santa Hat. The full body flexing wave motion he was making could not be mistaken as anything but the classic worm. Behind him, the Turian was holding a broom in one hand and a mop in the other with a metal bucket over his head sliding backwards on his feet doing a very good impression of the moon walk.

The Quarian girl had changed from a purple to a completely yellow environmental suit while doing the splits on the kitchen table while displaying an impressive amount of flexibility in the way she was curving her body to the beat. It brought back fond memories of the first time he had encountered Asari strippers at work.

At first the Illusive Man thought that perhaps Operative Lawson was being the sanest out of the entire specialist on board in her rather conservative rhythmic dance that would not have been out of place at a club dance floor. But closer inspection showed that the person wearing iconic white and black trimmed cat suit was bald. Staring for a moment longer, he realized that it was not Lawson, but actually the convict wearing Miranda's outfit.

Being a red blooded male who was still young enough to be interested in the opposite gender for more than simply conversation, the Illusive Man made the connection many would have in thinking that perhaps Jack and Miranda had swapped outfits, meaning the genetically perfect woman would have nothing covering her upper body save two straps and a neck choker. He was not disappointed.

Feeling an alarming amount of blood rush from his head towards a more southern region, the leader of Cerberus tore his eyes way from the nearly naked form of his best operative currently writhing on the ground in a painfully sexy dance to save himself from complete embarrassment.

Of course in moving his eyes away, he instead caught sight of the Geth unit doing ironically enough a perfect rendition of the robot, though interestingly enough it was wearing a sandwich board with bold letters stating, "No Data Available". There was probably a story behind that.

The assassin was currently doing a handstand against the wall while flailing his legs wildly in a running motion with nothing but a towel covering his crotch. Someone had donned a giant pink fluffy bunny suit, god knows when they managed to smuggle that on board, but upon close inspections of the crew members remaining it was most likely the thief, the only person not seen.

The Salarian doctor was juggling an alarming amount of tableware and cutlery while spinning in place and hopping on one leg. The Krogan was doing dead lifts and lunges with a shirtless Zaeed held horizontal across his palms in a classic lazy side sexy pose with an arm propping up his head while his one good eye was winking at the camera. And to top it off, gently floating at slightly above neck level was the Jusitacar, held aloft by her biotics while her body was laid out straight as a board, gently drifting between the crewmembers going wild.

It felt like he had been watching for an eternity, but the atrocity ended just as abruptly as it began. Taking a deep breath, the Illusive Man sat back down and massaged his temples. They were going on a suicide mission. It was understandable that the crew needed some sort of outlet. Perfectly normal.

"They couldn't just get drunk and go streaking like normal people could they?" he grumbled.

Cerberus was going to need to do a lot of damage control to avoid becoming a laughing stock. He would probably have to order a number of high profile assassinations or something to get the galaxy to take his organization seriously again after this fiasco. Heaving a deep long suffering sigh he drained the rest of his glass and called his assistant.

"Get me Kai Lang."

**AN: So brief bout of insanity I had while in class, thought I'd share =D hope you guys liked it. Feel free to write your own variation if you want! Don't think I've seen anyone do something like this, but apologies if I'm stepping on your creation.**


	2. The Geth has a question

Breakfast time on the Normandy was usually a quiet affair. The A shift crew would be the first to get in line and get their food at 6 a.m. sharp ship time and then move on to their stations. The ground side specialists would then drift in about an hour later depending on who they were and what their personalities were like. For example, Jack would never be seen out of her hole as Miranda coined it, until at least an hour before noon. Mordin would often be one of the first in line after the A shift crew, gobbling down his meal in under 5 minutes and back in his lab after exchanging pleasantries with people nearby.

Sometimes the ground side crew would dine with people they found as pleasant company, while other times they just ate with whoever was present. Currently it was 8 local time, and John was busying demolishing his plate of continental next to Garrus who was chewing on a brown and green bar while warily eyeing the copious amounts of yellow substance on his best friends plate. Miranda sat across from them, sipping on her ever present cup of coffee having finished breakfast already, but choosing to enjoy the company of her crew mates with Tali next to her busily sucking on a food paste tube attached to her mouth port.

The ding of the elevator announced the arrival of someone else, and the steady clank of metallic feet let everyone within earshot know it was their resident Geth. Tali narrowed her eyes behind her visor while subtly reaching across to her back where her shotgun would be. Miranda raised an eyebrow while Garrus leaned over and nudged the commander with a knowing smirk.

Commander Sheppard rolled his eyes at his friend's antics but pushed his plate away from himself as the Geth unit marched into view.

"Legion, don't normally see you out and about this early," the commander said. "What can I do for you?"

The elongated neck with the flashlight eye swiveled back and forth between the organics seated at the table.

"Greetings Creator Tali, Officer Vakarian, Officer Lawson, Sheppard Commander. We have an inquiry."

While Tali began to inch away from her species lifelong nemeses and encroaching on Miranda's personal space in the process, Shepard shrugged his shoulders noncommittally. For whatever reason, ever since Legion had been reactivated, whenever it had a question about organic behavior it would ask the commander and no one else.

"Shoot."

"Please specify a target."

Garrus snickered while Miranda hid her smirk behind her cup.

"It means to speak whatever is on your mind."

The Geth's face plates flared for a moment before the eye light dimmed. "Understood, assimilating new information."

By then Tali was practically in Miranda's lap, and the woman was doing an admirable job of ignoring the Quarian's invasion of her personal body space, regarding the situation with more amusement then annoyance. A far cry from the cold and aloof executive officer that had first boarded the SR2. Time spent in Sheppard's company had a way of changing people.

"Your question Legion?"

"This unit was browsing the extranet in order to assimilate information on organic behavior in order to better understand and facilitate future interaction. Investigation has shown that humans deviate greatly from the normal practices of other sapient species. We wish to understand the purpose behind certain human practices that have no representation among other species."

Garrus guffawed as he clapped Legion on the shoulder. "Legion, you're just coming across the phenomena the rest of the galaxy has come to accept years ago. Humans are weird!"

Even Tali managed a snicker at that.

Rolling his eyes at his friend's immaturity, John waved a hand to get Legion's attention who was currently swiveling its head between Garrus and Tali.

"Don't listen to these two clowns. What did you want to know?"

There was a brief pause as the Geth looked directly at John, the soft whirs and clicks of its mechanized body being the only sounds being made.

"What is the purpose of anal sex?"

A rivet of brown exploded out of Miranda's mouth and nose as she sprayed the commander across from her when she choked on her coffee. Alarmed, Tali began to pound on the genetically perfect woman's back while Garrus turned a confused look at the wet commander.

"What in Spirit's name is anal sex? Is that what I think it sounds like?" The Turian equivalent of flabbergasted apparently involved a slightly loose jaw with mandibles splayed wide.

"But that's…" spluttered Tali as she continued to pound on a coughing Miranda's back, "That's completely unsanitary! Why would you perform…near…what's wrong with you humans?!"

John wiped the coffee off his face and felt his neck growing red at the topic at hand. This was not what he had envisioned when Legion had said it had a question.

"Well I don't know, it's supposed to feel good!"

"But fecal matter comes out of there!" exclaimed a horrified Garrus.

A retching noise could be heard from Tali. "Oh Keelah, I think I'm going to be sick."

"Look, in human's the anus is clustered by a number of nerves that are almost as abundant as those found on the sexual organs. It's no surprise that people might want to do that there if it's pleasurable," John said defensively.

Tali abruptly got up from the table and rushed past Legion making for the women's bathroom. Garrus shook his head in disbelief and pushed his seat back out.

"Whatever you say John. This is one conversation I don't want any part of. I'll be in the battery making some calibrations or something if you need me." With that the Turian left the table as well.

"Sheppard, Commander, we did not mean to cause distress."

Sighing to himself while futilely trying to pat his shirt dry with a napkin, John shook his head.

"I know Legion. Tell you what, why don't you ask Doctor Chakwas or Mordin? I'm sure they would both be more than happy to field that question for you."

"Understood Sheppard Commander."

The Geth unit shuffled away towards the doctor's office, presumably to continue its quest for the answer to its question."

Turning back to his now cold plate of food, John caught sight of a slightly smirking Miranda who had recovered from her coughing fit.

"What?" he asked with a scowl.

"So… have you ever gone brown?" the perfect woman asked coyly with a sultry smirk, causing the commander to choke on the mouthful of eggs he had shoveled down in irritation.

Laughing to herself, the executive officer of the Normandy got up from the table and headed to her office with an extra sway in her ample hips. Turning before she entered, she winked at the commander who had finally with much pounding on his chest managed to choke down the mouthful of eggs.

Watching the automatic doors close after Miranda, John felt the gears in his head turning. Giving up on trying deciphering if there were any hidden meanings, or hidden offers in the woman's exit comments and actions, John returned to his breakfast. A nice quite breakfast.


	3. You don't get it Lawson

Miranda Lawson liked to think she had a pretty good read on people. It didn't take much interaction before she could peg a person for what they're worth. Shepard, if you were to only look at is dossier showed an excellent officer with a record that few could even come close to. Yet the files of documents on his heroics and service records do little justice to the actual man she had brought back from the dead. The sheer charisma that oozed out from the man's very presence could never truly be described in words, simply experienced for those lucky few who had been graced by his passing.

The executive officer of the Normandy took a sip from her mug as she reviewed the latest shipment requests being put in for their next dry dock run. Barely a month since his introduction back to the land of the living and already he had managed to complete his entire team of specialists, save half the colony of Horizon from abduction and infiltrating the collector ship that had turned out to be a trap that they had just barely managed to escape by the skin of their teeth.

Frowning as she thought back to the Illusive Man's deception, Miranda couldn't help but feel a minor jab of irritation at her boss. For the past month under Shepard's command she had been trying to convince the commander that Cerberus was not as bad as most people thought. At first it had been a simple attempt to sway the man over to their side, an asset that needed to be controlled, but as time pressed on and she watched the many miracles that the commander managed to pull off in the face of her own beliefs, she couldn't help but question her own stance.

Her defense of Cerberus became more personal as she came to admire the commander more and more. It wasn't just approval of the organization, but approval of her choice in joining the organization. And if she were to be truthful to herself, there was a fair bit of attraction thrown in there as well. The Illusive man, damn him, had pretty much just torn her case to pieces in one fell move. She could see the value to what her boss was saying, but having spent the past month working with a man so up front it was at times offensive, it was jarring to suddenly get a throw back to 'need to know'.

Sighing to herself, Miranda continued to browse through the handheld display, crossing one shapely leg as she leaned back in her star side comfy chair by the window, a small luxury afforded to the XO of the ship. A frantic knock broke the genetically perfect woman out of her revere and she checked her omnitool for the time. It was 11:03 p.m. ship time. The only people who should be awake were the B shift crew and there were no scheduled meetings with her as far as she knew.

Curious as to whom it may have been, she called up a security feed at the entrance to her doorway. Standing side by side was Garrus and Tali, both seemingly quite nervous with the way they were alternating between pacing and bouncing on their toes. She watched for a couple more seconds as Garrus passed by the entryway again and raised a taloned fist to pound on her door, this time more urgently.

"Come in, it's open," she called, wondering what the two closest people to Shepard wanted with her.

The automatic doors slipped apart and the two aliens practically ran into her room.

"Lawson!" Garrus half shouted. "You have to stop him! You can't let him go through with this! It'll be the death of us all!"

Tali was nodding her head frantically at his side her fingers practically a blur as she wrung her hands.

Raising her hands in a placating fashion, Miranda got up from her seat and moved behind her desk. "Slow down. Stop who from doing what?"

"You've seen the latest shipment requests haven't you?" demanded Tali. "Keelah, he's trying to order another one!"

Now truly confused, Miranda glanced down at her display pad. "Shepard? What's he trying to order?"

"A Mako! He's trying to get another god damn Mako!" said Garrus. A small whimpering noise came from Tali who seemed to shrink into herself at the mention of the Alliance tank of choice.

Raising an eyebrow at the two aliens seeming nervous breakdown, Miranda indicated for the two to sit. Garraus collapsed onto the seat, causing the metal frame to groan slightly under the weight of the armored Turian as he flopped bonelessly against the furniture while Tali held herself stiffly as if expecting a Geth to burst out of the closet and attack her at any moment

"And why is the commander's choice in getting a tank a bad thing? We certainly could use the firepower ground side given the kinds of missions we've been running into."

Tali dropped her helmeted head into her palms and began to mutter lowly words which Miranda's translator didn't pick up. Garrus had both hands gripped on the edges of the seat so tight she half expected there to be indentations later.

"You don't get it," he said, "John's a great man. Greatest man I've ever met, my best friend. I'd lay down my life for him without a second thought. But he has his faults like the rest of us."

"You mean besides his inability to handle himself on a dance floor?" Miranda quipped with a half-smile.

Garrus managed to pause long enough to let out a hysterical chuckle. "Sure a few toes get bruised if he goes clubbing. But this isn't some minor thing we're talking about here. The can't drive to save his life Lawson! I've seen him defy the laws of gravity behind the wheel of the Mako, and not in a good way! The closest I ever came to dying while chasing Saren was in that damn tank! And I'm comparing this to getting shot in the neck! We're as good as dead if he gets his hands on another of those monstrosities!"

Tali had seemingly muted her external speakers as her mouthpiece light was still flashing without sounds, but she was nodding her head at Garrus's every words.

Leaning her back into her seat, Miranda scratched the side of her cheek as she considered her crewmates. "It can't be that bad."

The two aliens exchanged a look.

**FLASHBACK**

"_Cliff! Cliff! Cliff!" screamed Garrus in a decidedly unmanly high pitched voice._

"_I see it!" shouted John as the Mako spun so hard it practically did a 180. The external camera showed the two back wheels of the tank skid off and over the stomach churning drop into the pool of lava halfway down the mountaintop._

_Wrex howled something unintelligible, halfway between a battle cry and something that sounded like mommy as he continued to liberally spray the incoming Geth forces with the top mounted machine gun._

_Ashley was hunched over in one of the passenger seats, face tinged a little green as white knuckled hands crushed her rifle stock in an iron grip while prayers to St. Mary escaped her lips. Tali was curled up in a fetal position next to her muttering in her native tongue._

"_TAKE THAT MOTHERFUCKER!" screamed Kaiden as he loaded another shell into the Mako's main cannon. It seemed that fear made the normally soft spoken and mild mannered lieutenant unusually foul mouthed, though oddly enough he retained his normal composure while under deadly fire from all directions on groundside combat. Something about the Mako just brought out the worst in the man._

"_GO LEFT!" the human biotic shrieked._

_John hauled the Mako hard to the left, again pulling off a physics defying turn to avoid sending the team plummeting to their deaths._

"_Geez, Kaiden you need to calm down and talk in your normal voice before you blow out my ear drums," grumbled the commander as he continued to maneuver wildly past the dozens of rockets trying to nail the fast moving tank._

"_THIS IS MY NORMAL VOICE!" _

_John turned around, taking his eyes completely off the road as he continued to maneuver the tank with his hands while examining Kaiden's red face with concern. _

"_Seriously Lieutenant, you need to chill out. Your blood pressure must be through the roof."_

"_JOHN the road! The road!" screamed Garrus in his best impression of a prepubescent turian._

_The spectre turned around just in time to jerk the Mako into a spin that avoided a head on collision with an unlucky colossus that only had its front left leg taken out form where the durable tank clipped it._

"_And Wrex," said John, "You need to time your shots with the gun or it will overheat."_

_A quick glance at the onboard computer showed that the machinegun had in fact overheated almost half a minute ago, though that didn't seem to stop Wrex from yelling and holding the triggers down despite the fact the gun wasn't working._

"_Everyone ok back there?" shouted the commander._

_Tali broke down into tears._

**End FLASHBACK**

The two aliens turned back to look at Miranda, the shaking of their heads in an odd mirror movement.

"Trust us Lawson, if you want this mission to even come close to succeeding, tell the commander you can't get your hands on a Mako," Garrus said with a look of complete seriousness on his face.

Seeing how shaken the two aliens were, Miranda shrugged. "Alright, then I'll pass word up to HQ that the request for the Mako is a no go."

The tension seemed to leave both aliens bodies in hearing her deceleration and Garrus even managed to break out into a shaky smile.

"If we make it back from the Omega 4 relay, it'll be down to this one moment that insured we lived long enough to pull the mission off" he said with a chuckle.

Slightly bewildered by her shipmates reactions, she nodded to them as they got up to leave.

"You know, maybe you Cerberus types aren't that bad," said Tali as she paused at the doorway. "At least you can be reasoned with."

Raising an eyebrow in astonishment at being complimented by a Quarian of all people, Miranda watched the automatic doors shut.

Pulling up the request form, she carefully put in a side note to the operators that the tank was not needed. Turning on the terminal, she pulled up the file that she had recently received from another Cerberus Cell.

Yes, there was no need for the Mako. The model was obsolete anyways. This mission needed the cutting edge in every aspect, and right now what they needed was the fresh off the assembly line Hammerhead Tank.

**TWO WEEKS LATER**

"Cliff! Cliff! Cliff!" screamed Garrus in a decidedly unmanly high pitched voice.

"I see it!" shouted John as he activated the booster thrusters, sending the lightly armored hovercraft shooting upwards into the sky.

Quite whimpers came from the backseat where Tali had been seated.

"AFTERBURNERS! AFTERBURNERS!"

"Geez Miranda, you need to calm down and talk in your normal voice before you blow out my eardrums," grumbled the commander.

AN: haha this scene popped in my head while I was working hope you liked it.


	4. You've got mail

**To: Garrus Vakarian**

**From: Solona Vakarian**

Garrus what the hell happened to your face? Is this why you never have video on when you call me? I had to find out from some stupid trending video on GalaxyNet that my big brother lost half his face?! What the hell is going on?! Why are you back on the Normandy? I hear its being run by Cerberus, you know the anti anything not human organization that you helped take down back on the original Normandy? You better get your ass over to the communicator and dial me as soon as you see this, and turn the damn video on!

Sis

P.S.

If I don't get a call from you in next 24 hours I'm forwarding the video to dad. We'll see who's laughing then.

P.P.S.

There something going on with you and the quarian?

**To: John Shepard**

**From: Hannah Shepard**

I didn't believe it when rumors started going about that you were still alive, and I still had my doubts it was you even when Anderson told me. But after seeing that video, I have no doubts that it's you. WHEN WERE YOU GOING TO CALL YOUR MOTHER? I HAD TO FIND OUT MY SON WAS REALLY ALIVE BECAUSE HE WAS PRANCING AROUND FOR THE WHOLE WORLD TO SEE IN HIS UNDERWEAR?! I want your ass on the Citadel next week on the 7nth at 5:00 no excuses Johnny. I'll have shore leave then.

Mom

P.S.

Really pink? I thought I taught you to have better taste than that son. Unless you're telling me it was that leggy brunette that picked it out for you. Then I approve =D

**To: Tali Zorah vas Normandy**

**From: Shala Ran vas Tombay**

LOL

Auntie Ran

P.S.

Is there something going on with you and the Turian? =D?

**To: Councilor Sparatus**

**From: Garrus Vakarian**

Enclosed: video file

I thought you might enjoy this. Take the stick out of the ass a little. Trust me, it's liberating.

G. Man

P.S.

By the time you see this I'll be through the Omega Four Relay on a mission to save the galaxy from the Reapers. Again. What have you been up to lately?

**To: Miranda Lawson**

**From: Oriana Lawson**

Enclosed: Video File

OMFG you are the most awesome big sis in the world! I could not stop LMFAO when I saw it! People around the galaxy are copying you guys =D LOL check out the turian platoon version, they're about to overtake your video in views! It's friggin hilarious XD

Baby Sis

**To: Jacob Taylor**

**From: Illusive Man**

Completely unprofessional Mr. Taylor, I had expected better from you and Lawson. This completely violates the secrecy clause of your contract with Cerberus that you signed stating that you will do your utmost to ensure the privacy of our organization.

Boss

**Reply To: Illusive Man**

**From: Jacob Taylor**

Really? You're lecturing me on the secrecy clause? You have Cerberus logo's plastered on everything. All our clothes, our guns, the god damn utensils all carry that stupid mark. The fucking toilet paper has our logo stamped on each square! Even the Krogan on Tuchanka know what our symbol looks like and you think we're compromising organizational security?

Jacob

**To: Grunt**

**From: Wrex**

Was that Massani you were lifting? That old war dogs still alive? Listen to him whelp, you can learn a lot about killing and explosions. Tell him I said he still owes me 50 creds.

Wrex

P.S.

You need to lean down more on your lunges.


	5. Goddamn Suicide

**AN: A little something I whipped up in class. Enjoy!**

"This is goddamn suicide!"

The group crowded in the medical bay of the Normandy rolled their eyes collectively.

"Zaeed, you say that about every mission we go on," deadpanned Jacob in exasperation.

"Yeah well this time I goddamn well mean it," gripped the scarred mercenary. "This is goddamn suicide!"

"Enclosed space, sparse lighting, unknown factors," Garrus ticked off a talon with each point he made. "Think I'm starting to agree with old scar face over here."

"Oh ha fucking ha Archangel. You take a look in a mirror lately? You ain't no pop princess yourself."

"Look," snarled Jack, "are we going to do this or what? I got better things to do than standing around with a bunch of morons holding their balls wondering when they drop."

"Oh like you have anything better to do," snorted Miranda with a disdainful sneer at the convict.

"What was that cheerleader?" The shirtless woman stomped up to glare into the Cerberus operative's face. "I thought I heard someone say they wanted a foot shoved up their perfect little ass!"

The two women began to smolder with biotic energy as they glared at each other, causing everyone else to instinctively back up.

"Enough!" barked the Commander. "We need to take care of this before it gets out of hand."

"Shep," laughed Kasumi with her omni recorder light on and held high, "I think it's already pretty out of hand."

Ignoring the thief and the resentful murmurs from his groundside crew, John turned his attention to Dr. Chakwas. The steel haired woman was standing with her arms crossed, a perturbed look on her face due to the number of people crowding her work space.

"Doc, hand the package over to Dr. Solus. He'll make sure that it's properly delivered."

"Commander, I assure you that I am perfectly capable of-"

"No, no, no. Risk too high. Perfectly qualified to ensure proper procedure. Best you stay behind and assess injuries after."

The graying doctor sighed in defeat and handed over the item in question to her Salarian colleague.

"Do be careful in there commander. There's no telling how he might react."

Nodding to the ship doctor, the commander gave his team a once over. These were the best of the best in the galaxy, each individual an exemplary of their field. They had gone on countless raids against the worst mercenary groups the Terminus had to offer and even managed to halt the collector invasion of Horizon with zero casualties to their landing force. They were the best at what they did. They could do this. Frowning as he noticed Zaeed palming his old battered rifle John fought an urge to roll his eyes. Maybe they were a bit too good at what they did.

"Zaeed, put the damn gun away. We're not shooting anyone."

"The hell am I supposed to do in there?! Tickle him?!"

Garrus chuckled nervously and scratched at his bandaged face with a talon earning him a reproachful look form Dr. Chakwas. "Maybe we should try asking him nicely?"

Snorting mirthlessly, John placed a hand on the holo display that would allow entry into the AI core. "Right, you do that Garrus. Everyone ready?"

The people in the room all gave their various forms of consent with much grumbling involved.

"Goddamn suicide I tell you."

With a slam of his fist, the commander parted the doorway like the sea before Moses and the team stormed in as one.

"Grunt!" bellowed John as the group piled onto the struggling Krogan who despite his hump had somehow wedged himself between two of Edi's processer units in an attempt to hide. "You're getting your vaccinations!"

"NO! I won't!"

**Two hours later **

"So what happened next?" asked Rupert with morbid interest from his place leaning up against the kitchen sink. The horde of Cerberus personal crowded around Zaeed all held their breath in anticipation.

The seasoned mercenary snorted as he continued feeding himself with one hand, the other holding up an ice pack up against his swollen eye.

"It was a goddamn massacre, that's what! I was having flashbacks to the cluster fuck of a mission I took into the Krogan DMZ a couple years back it was so bad."

"Ach, don't hold out on us old man!" demanded Donnley in his heavy Scottish accent as he learned forward eagerly. "What happened next?"

Wiping his mouth, Zaeed snorted. "Like I said, a goddamn massacre. Shepard, brave bastard, led the charge in. Grabbed the Krogan around the neck and actually managed to pin the big stupid bastard to the floor underneath him."

Leaning back in his seat, the older man rotated his shoulder and winced at the pain.

"So here they were, four hundred pounds of genetically perfect krogan and whatever the fuck Cerberus put into Shepard, tussling like a rodeo straight out of hell in this tiny cramped room with us barreling in behind them like a runaway train."

Fishing around inside his pocket, Zaeed pulled up a cigar and began to chew thoughtfully on the end of it, milking his audience for all their attention.

"Garrus goes barging into that mess, shoulder checking Grunt and sending the three of them into the back wall of the room. Shepard goes and gets his head smacked into the wall and is out cold like a goddamn lightweight."

Leaning back on his seat, Zaeed propped his boots up on the mess table, careful to keep the ice pack balanced on his swollen eye.

"Then Lawson rushes into the fray to try to get the drop on the Krogan, but before she even gets close that crazy bitch Jack howls like a banshee and throws herself in with a biotic rush from behind the rest of us!"

The crowd of people burst out into excited murmurs as Zaeed rubbed his face with his free hand trying to stem the pain in his temples as he recalled what happened next.

"Knockback from the rush scatters all of us like bowling pins and the XO somehow ends up under Shepard, Grunt and Garrus. Poor woman."

The whole room winced as they imagined having the three heaviest members of the crew piled up on them. Leaning back further in his seat Zaeed allowed his good eye to wander across his awestruck audience, enjoying the attention.

"So here me and Taylor was still picking ourselves up from the ground and all the while Jack's wailing on Grunt's face like he owes her blood money screaming something about how she was gonna destroy him. The big lizard then goes and grabs Jack around the middle to try to lift her up and drop her on the ground, but Jack's having none of that. Girl wraps herself in a biotic field to increase her weight to try to keep her feet, but Grunt goes and manages to get her to his shoulder anyways. She don't go quietly though, so here they were flailing about like a pair of guppies trying to mate out of water screaming nonsense at each other, when the Salarian doctor goes and drops a neural shock into the mix!"

"How are any of you still alive?" asked Joker, disbelief coloring his face.

"Hell if I know," grumbled Zaeed. "Anyways, with those two tearing shit up, it was like trying to piss on your forehead while standing up. Of course he misses! Jack takes a bolt to her ass and ends up seizing like she's on an overdose trip, drooling out the side of her mouth like a retard. Grunt goes and dumps her on the ground while everyone's wondering what the hell to do next and that's when the Turian finally decides to get his miserable ass off the ground and grabs the Krogan from behind in a full nelson, shouting some shit about needing to calm down."

"His inner cop coming out," snorted Joker getting shushes from the other crewmembers even as snickers broke out at the Turian's expense.

"So here I thought we had a golden opportunity right? Me and Taylor rush up and began working on the Krogan bastard hoping to soften him up before Mordin can hit him with another neural shock. Course the only thing that got softened were our goddamn fists, felt like I was punching a cement wall."

"What was Kasumi doing during all this?" asked Gabby.

Snorting Zaeed scratched his brow line. "Girl was filming this while laughing her ass off in the background next to Mordin."

"She got this on film?!"

"Goddamn right she did. Course she got what was coming in the end, just like the rest of us. Where was I? Right so here Taylor and I were pounding on the Krogan with the Turian holding the big brute back. Taylor gets too goddamn close like the idiot that he is and Grunt drops the dumb bastard with a head butt. Man was out in an instant. Jack goes and finally gets her feet underneath her after her little seizing fit and seemed to have finally come to her senses and goes puts a lift on the Krogan like she should have in the first place. Course Garrus was too damn close and gets caught up in the field too, so now we had two big ass armored aliens floating and flailing about while shouting up a storm of curses and there I was caught in the middle trying to keep my ass clear of the lift field before something bad happened."

Swiping his omnitool up and igniting his cigar, Zaeed took a deep drag and puffed out a perfect ring through his lips before continuing.

"Mordin finally takes his cue to rush in and try to inject Grunt with the pig-sticker of a needle Chakwas gave him while the brute was helpless, but that was when Lawson finally managed to get up on her feet. Let me tell you, I've seen some pissed off women in my time, but it was nothing compared to the look on her face. I'm old enough that pride don't matter as much no more so I'll tell you, I damn near pissed myself when I saw that look. The way she screamed, hell I think even Jack jumped out of her skin, and don't let her tell you otherwise. Woman goes and rushes in with a fist cocked back full of biotic energy with blood pouring down her face like someone fixed a faucet into her forehead all prepared to pummel the shit out of the Krogan. Course she probably wasn't thinking too clearly through her concussion or maybe she just wasn't seeing straight from all the blood loss, otherwise she'd have realized throwing together two biotic fields in an enclosed space like that was a bigger disaster than a backed up toilet on Tuchanka."

"Was that the explosion we heard?" asked Kelly with a look of worry.

"You goddamn right there was an explosion," grunted Zaeed as he shifted the bag of ice on his face so he could glare at the ship yeoman. "I saw it coming a mile away, but wasn't shit I could do. Damn explosion pretty much put down anyone who was still awake and on their feet. I get blown clear through the door and skipped off the ceiling before landing on Chakwas's goddamn desk. Felt like I damn near broke my spine in two. Had a great view of Taylor's unconscious ass clipping Kasumi in the head on the way out. Bastard somehow managed to land on Chakwas at the end putting the doctor down too. I was the only one to not have to get carried out of that mess."

Sighing, Zaeed rubbed his good eye. The crew broke out into chuckles over the story of how the entire ground team of arguably the most deadly crew in the galaxy and the ship doctor managed to get themselves knocked out cold in one instant.

"That's why they pay you the big bucks Zaeed!" jeered Joker.

Laughter broke out again as the people in the mess gave the mercenary some good natured nudges and back slaps.

"Well they don't pay me enough to deal with this shit," growled the older man.

Closing his eyes, he continued to smoke his cigar, a silent dismissal to his audience. Getting the hint, the people began to disperse, leaving in groups chatting and laughing about the latest mishap on the Normandy.

"So Zaeed…if Mordin and Chakwas were both down, who gave Grunt his vaccination?" asked a curious Kelly, the only one left at the table.

Zaeed's one good eye popped open comically wide as the blood drained from his face. The lit cigar fell out of his mouth into his lap but he paid the burning sensation no heed. His mouth opened and closed as words failed to come out.

"…Zaeed?"

"EDI! Where's the damn Krogan?!"

"Grunt is currently in his room. He regained consciousness a few minutes ago and left the medbay."

"GODDAMN IT!"

**AN: I always liked Zaeed =D so here's my tribute to the most bad ass mercenary in the Terminus! Hope that got a few laughs. Got two more stories lined up for some shits and giggles so stay tuned!**


	6. Shepard has a question

**AN: Thanks to everyone who reviewed! Nice to know i got at least a few laughs for my efforts**

The Illusive Man breathed out a sigh of relief as he entered his private quarters. Counter to what most people might believe it was a rather spartan room with very little in terms of material goods. Much less than what most men of his position would indulge in at any rate.

Kicking his expensive leather shoes off with practiced ease, he pulled off his Armani suit jacket and hung it on a wooden frame that was hooked into a closet full of similarly expensive clothing hidden by a seamless wall.

"Computer, play me Bach, Sarabande."

The soft hum of classical instruments did wonders to soothe his frayed nerves and the Illusive Man couldn't help but allow himself a small indulgent smile as he poured himself a glass of wine. Taking a whiff of the expensive Italian import, he savored the multitude of flavors as they glided across his tongue and down his throat. Nothing but an evening of soft music and light reading in bed.

Dropping heavily onto the cushioned material of his mattress, he allowed himself a sigh of content as he placed the glass of wine on the table next to the bedframe. Grabbing a carefully preserved leather bound copy of Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace, he removed the book mark and began to read.

Barely a paragraph in and his personal omnitool flashed a priority warning. It was from Miranda Lawson. Instantly all relaxation fled his body. The Illusive Man practically bolted out of bed as he pulled up his subordinates call.

"Talk to me," he said. Oddly he noted that the view screen function had been turned off from Miranda's end.

"Is..is this.. is this the Illusive Man?"

Taken aback by the masculine voice attempting a failed imitation of the higher tones of a woman, the Illusive Man took a moment to regain his composure before answering.

"Who is this?! How did you get on this channel?!"

"This is..This is Miranda Lawson *hic* I.. I just wanted to say.. I really enjoy kissing your ass…!" the words were slurred and barely comprehendible.

"I practice kissing my pillow every night," here the speaker broke out into a fit of hysterical giggles. "I close *hic*… I close my eyes and imagine it's you..r..your.. hairy ass…"

As the caller broke out into another snickering fit, the Illusive Man massaged his aching temples. This was not happening. He was in some weird sick twisted dream and he was going to wake up at any moment to discover that he had fallen asleep while reading.

"Shepard is that you?"

"What?! No..Uh no this is uh *hic* this is Jacob Taylor!" the obviously drunk commander wasn't even trying to change his voice anymore.

Grinding his teeth together the Illusive Man pinched his nose, hoping to stem the incoming migraine.

"Shepard, get off this line and back into bed before you hurt yourself."

"Alright.. …u you got me. It's Shepp…*hic*Shepard. Tim… I just..Tim..uh can I call you Tim? Don't kno..know your name. Embarrassing…"

The commander broke off into incoherent muttering and a dull thump was heard through the line, like the man had fallen to the floor.

"Shepard…? Shepard are you alright?" the Illusive Man asked tentatively. Unbelievably stupid situation or not, if Shepard had killed himself due to intoxication, well there went four billion credits of investments.

"mmfine. Just fel-fal-…I'm ok."

"Shepard, you're drunk. Go back to bed before you hurt yourself."

"I'm not drunk!" the commander roared back, startling the Illusive Man's heart into skipping a beat. "Just..just not sober is all."

The pain in the Illusive Man's temple was practically blinding him in his left eye.

"Shepard. Go. To. Bed."

"mmk. But..Can..ca..can I ask you a ques…*hic* question first?"

Breathing out evenly through is nose and trying very hard not to scream into the comm line the Illusive Man sat down on the edge of the bed. He could do this.

"Sure. What's your question Shepard?"

"Are..are you.. are you my dad?"

The Illusive Man felt his jaw drop with disbelief. Of all the inane questions a drunk could possibly entertain, this had not even come to his mind. He was so astonished that the pain in his temple failed to register.

"Wha-..what?!"

"I..I mean it makes sense. Mo..mom neve..never talks *hic* about him, don't..don't know who he was ..don't..don..know what he looks like. Never…nev..knew him. But you sp..*hic* spent four…four billion to bring me back. 're sec.. secre..secret..you're my dad right? *hic*"

Feeling the migraine return in full force, the Illusive Man swore he felt a molar crack from how hard he clenched his teeth.

"No Shepard. I'm not your father."

"Yo..you can tell me. I *hic* I won't tell no one. Promise."

"Shepard, I am not your father."

"But it makes sense.. Like in Star Wars.. Luke's..*hic* Luke's dad was Vadar the bad guy…but Vadar was being tricked by the emperor and t..tries..tries to bring his son to *hic* to the dark side. Just lik..like…how you ke..keep telling me Cerberus isn't so bad *hic*. But Luke saves his dad in the end..I can do it too! I..I'll save you from the dark side *hic* dad."

"Shepard, listen to the words that are coming out of my mouth. I. Am. Not. Your. Father."

"You fucking liar!" the commander's voice broke as a sob escaped through the speaker. "You..you told me you were my dad! Now you say you're not! I HATE YOU!"

"Wha-?!" The line abruptly cut off as the Illusive Man stared down at his omnitool in disbelief. Had that really just happened?

Taking a deep breath and a moment to try to erase all the memories from the past five minutes, the Illusive Man reached for the wine glass before changing his mind and drank deeply straight from the bottle instead. What in the hell did he do to deserve this?

Breathing out as he drained away the last of the bottle he carelessly threw it against the door and watched the glass explode through half lidded eyes. Snorting to himself, the Illusive Man dropped back into bed with an explosive sigh and reached for his book, determined not to have his night off ruined by the randomness of the last couple of minutes.

His eyes had barely found where he had left off when his omnitool beeped once more alerting him to a priority message, this one from Kai Leng.

"WHAT?! WHAT COULD IT POSSIBLY BE?!" screamed the Illusive Man into his comm.

"You..You gotta help me! I think she's fucking dead!" shouted a panic faced Kai Leng.

Momentarily taken aback, the Illusive Man calmed down somewhat telling himself that Leng was not to blame for Shepard's little intoxicated stunt that had ruined his night.

"Who's dead Leng?"

"I dunno.. I don't…some Asari hooker..Mari? Mary?"

"…What?"

"We were doing some sand…I know I'm not suppose..supposed to be..but she was hot… and she'd said she'd embrace ete..eternity with me if we did some sand…so I was like fuck yeah! And damn I banged her brains out bro!...yeah, but…I think she ODed."

The slightly vacant look that most high out of their minds individuals would have in their eyes was covered by the lens Kai Lang wore over his eyes and for a moment the Illusive Man thought he was going to explode. He was surrounded by incompetent idiots.

"Leng. You. Are. An. Assassin. You kill people and hide their bodies for a living. Hide her damn body!"

Kai Leng's flickering image gave a slightly sheepish smile as he scratched his cheek. "Uh…well..uh well you see,*cough* I actually never hide the bodies per say…"

"…what?"

"Well I mean you always want high profile assassinations that grab people's attentions... sooo I usually leave the bodies lying around. Never really had to figure it out how to hide one before. "

The migraine had returned with reinforcements.

"I'm sure you can figure it out Leng," bit out the Illusive Man. "Dump the body and get your useless ass back to base."

He was going to put that failed N7 through enough detox programs to clean out a drug den full of idiots when he got his hands on the assassin.

"Yeah..uh..yeah. Uh one more question."

Exhaling slowly through his nose and wondering how much of his lifespan had been lost tonight due to stress, the leader of Cerberus sat down on his bed with an air of a defeated man.

"What is it?"

"Are you my dad?"

*click*

**AN: dunno why this scene popped into my head while i was in the shower, but it just would not escape me so i had to put it down haha**


	7. What doesn't kill you

**AN: you know this was a lot funnier in my head when I first imagined it but it's just not quite there. Not sure what I'm missing, but it's still good for a few kicks XD Thanks again to everyone who's reviewed! Greases the old imagination to know people are enjoying the outcomes of my mind spewing**

**EDIT: fixed spelling on Tomkah, thanks Garm88! Let me know if you guys see anything else out of place**

Walking down the twin rows of krogans acting as his honor guard, John felt a surreal sense of disbelief. This could not be happening. This was a hoax, a poor joke, a bad prank pulled by Garrus and Wrex. Any moment now, one of those ugly sons of a bitches will pop out from behind a pillar and bellow, "Surprise!" Everyone was going to burst out into laughter and he was going to wake up form this nightmare. Any moment now...any moment...right now...

Reaching the end of the honor guard that had pretty much consisted of all the males of clan Urdnot, John found himself at the weather beaten Tomkah that had taken them to Grunt's coming of age rite. Standing by himself next to the massive vehicle was the unarmored form of the shaman. The truly ancient krogan leveled a somber gaze at the commander before raising both hands up into the air and addressing the assembled warriors.

"You, battle brother of Urdnot Wrex, have been afforded a great honor. The ground soaked with the blood of your foes quakes in your passing and the stars tremble before the tales of your deeds. You have been found worthy to bestow upon the next generation the seed of life. May the path before you always be clear and the bodies of your foes trailing your back John Shepard!"

The crowd of krogan all grunted together as one before stomping on the ground in a rhythmic pattern.

"Of course. This…this is a great honor." The voice that had talked down Saren from ending galactic civilization sounded weak and shaky, a far cry from the normal commanding tones that brokered no arguments.

"May your seed scatter to the winds and find root in the hot soils of Tuchanka!"

The deep bass of the voices of hundreds of krogan repeated the words of blessing that filled John's heart with insurmountable dread. This was really happening. The Tomahawk door opened and the commander stepped forward with shaky legs. Praying silently that Garrus and Wrex were inside with shit eating grins on their faces, John stepped into the vehicle.

**Flashback**

"_There have been a number of breeding requests for Grunt and even one for you Commander Shepard." Edi's emotionless delivery caught John completely off guard as he snorted the water from his canteen out his nose._

_Coughing and spluttering, the first human spectre desperately tried to rid the burning sensation in his nasal cavity while shooting a heated glare at his turian friend who was practically on all four on the ground with laughter._

"_Shut up! It's not funny!"_

"_A krogan Shepard!" howled Garrus. Taking a deep steadying breath, the Turian broke out into a new fit of uncontrolled laughter much to John's chagrin. "Oh spirits save me, a krogan!"_

_Shuddering slightly at the unbidden image of a female version of Wrex, John opened his omnitool to examine the request. He was going to have nightmares about this for weeks. Worse than after Akuze. As he reached out to firmly press down on the deny button, he felt a jolt to his shoulder causing his finger to tilt slightly to the left, just enough to miss his intended target._

_Jaws dropping in horror, John turned slowly to look at Garrus whose hand was still raised up from his friendly back slap, a look of confusion on his scarred face._

"_What did you do?!" screeched John, eyes bugging out._

"_What?" asked Garrus, looking perplexed. "What did I do?"_

"_You made me hit accept!"_

"…_WHAT?!"_

"_Oh no..nonono.. this is not happening. This is not happening."_

_Breaking out in cold sweat, John glanced down desperately at his omnitool, hoping against hope that by some miracle that maybe the sensors had malfunctioned and had not reacted to his fingers movement. No such luck._

"_Look Shepard, I'm sure she sent it as a joke. I mean come on, a human and krogan? Who in their right minds would expect you to go through with it? I mean it's not like you can even reproduce together! The krogan are all about making babies cause of the genophage. We'll tell Wrex, have a good laugh about this then go grab a few strippers on Omega and forget all about this. I know a few girls who-" _

_The rest of Garrus's babbles of reassurance fell on deaf ears as John had already been lost to the mental image of a female Wrex demanding to be on top._

**Flashback End**

**Flashback (Sometime Later)**

"_And so, here we were, covered in Thresher Maw guts watching Grunt get carried off by a bunch of krogan chanting his name. And I turn to Shepard and said, we really need to get some helmet cams. The chicks never believe my stories!"_

_John burst into laughter alongside Wrex who was thumping his tankard of Ryncol on the table in mirth. After a few of the krogan homebrewed alcoholic beverage of choice, the commander was feeling much better about his situation. Heck he could even laugh at it._

_With a grin he waved the hand not holding the cup to get the laughing krogan's attention. "What happened after was even better, right Garrus?"_

_The turian nearly fell out of his seat laughing, too choked up to speak._

"_So I managed to get a breeding request from one of the females!"_

_Amber liquid spurted out of a huge nostril as Wrex snorted through a mouthful of the Ryncol he had been swallowing. Bursting into a deep bellied laugh that was punctuated by periodic coughs the old krogan slapped the commander across the back with enough force to nearly knock the man out of his seat._

"_Are you serious Shepard?! Only you!" The scarred krogan shook his crested head, wiping a tear of mirth away from his bloodshot eyes._

"_That's not the best part! So here I was about to hit deny, when Garrus," John shot a playful glare at the chuckling turian who finally had managed to regain some of his composure, "decided to slap me across the back causing me to hit accept!"_

_Both men in question burst out into new fits of laughter as they recalled the initial panic they had seized them when it happened. The laughter petered off as they noticed the serious expression on their large krogan companion._

"_Uh, Wrex you ok there?"_

_There was a solemn and disturbed expression on the ancient warriors face. "Shepard…I…I swore you and Garrus as blood brothers in order for you to be accepted as krant to Grunt in his trials."_

_Feeling a sense of unease build in his stomach John nodded slowly. "Yeah I remember that."_

"_That means you are Urdnot now in all but blood. You represent my clan as much as much as any krogan that bears that name."_

"_Right."_

"_And you accepted the female's breeding request."_

"_Yeah… it was an accident."_

_The serious look turned into a deep frown. "Shepard there can be no accidents in these matters. Breeding contracts are the highest honor that can be placed upon a member of any clan. To be offered the chance to sire offspring…you cannot refuse after accepting."_

"_WHAT?! But I can't even produce offspring with a female Krogan!"_

_Shaking his massive head the Krogan continued to frown as he contemplated his friend's situation. "It does not matter, breeding requests are sacred, a contract that cannot be undone. One has not been refuted after acceptance since the time before the genophage Shepard! If you were to go back on your word now, you would shame the female that made the offer greatly, spurning her as unfertile and unworthy of her sacred duties as brood mother. She would take her own life rather than face that disgrace."_

_Wrex leaned back into his seat, ruby eyes narrowed to slits in deep contemplation as he considered the situation and any possible way out for his friend. His brooding expression bore no good news for Shepard._

"_There would be great outrage at such sacrilege. You bear the name of Urdnot in spirit, and so we would all suffer the wrath of the female clans should this come to pass. They may bar any krogan bearing the name Urdnot from ever having mating rights again. My clan would be no more. You have to see this through."_

_The solemn expression that had returned to the giant reptile's face contained no jest. Wrex was being entirely serious. Turning slowly, the commander shared a brief uncomprehending stare with Garrus._

"_The future of my clan…no, the future of all krogan depends on this Shepard."_

_Well shit. How was he supposed to say no to that?_

**End Flashback**

For a brief moment, the krogan form inside the Tomkah filled John with elation. The joke was finally coming to an end! But when his eyes adjusted to the dim conditions within, he realized it was not Wrex in the seat, but Grunt.

"Battlemaster! You are headed for the female camps as well?" asked an overly eager Grunt.

Hope in his heart withered away like a snail beneath the cruel ministration of a child with a saltshaker.

"HA! It will be glorious! We must share our exploits when we are done!"

Unable to find his voice and feeling a small part of himself shrivel up and die on the spot, John sat down across from the tank born Krogan and simply nodded his head numbly. What was there to say to that?

**OMAKE**

"A krogan? You're goddamn shitting me Archangel. Shepard? A krogan?!"

The turian sitting at the table nursing a dextro brandy nodded miserably at the disbelieving Zaeed across from him.

"That's goddamn suicide!"

**AN: I just can't get enough of Zaeed XD His catchphrase can fit in just about anywhere.**


	8. Waking Sober I

**AN: Hallo, anyone still out there?**

Consciousness returned in the form of a searing pain that lanced through his plated skull. Garrus had been on a few benders in his time, and it was not hard to recognize the agony of an epic hangover. As his blurry vision cleared, he clawed his way to his feet, noting how the room was still tilting slightly despite the fact that the pain in his skull told him he was in fact sober. As he steadied himself against a nearby wall with his hand, two things became apparent to him. One, he was in the Normandy mess hall. Two, his bladder was going to implode into a miniature black hole if he did not get to a restroom quickly.

Using the wall as support the tall turian stumbled his way carefully towards where he thought the men's restroom was, all the while trying to keep his head from exploding from pain. Finally passing between the automatic doors that parted into the men's lavatory, Garrus made his way over to a urinal where he spent several moments desperately struggling with uncooperative armor in order to relieve himself.

Finally fumbling the latches free, he allowed a small moan of pleasure to escape his dry throat as his painfully tight bladder finally got to relax. As the stream of urine left his body, Garrus tried to recall exactly why it was he found himself recovering from a bout of alcoholic fueled memory lost. The more he tried to remember, the more painful his headache became, and finally he just gave up and allowed himself to enjoy in the simple relief of emptying his bladder.

"Damn," he grumbled to himself, "this one must be for the record books."

He had not expected a reply, so when there was a massive barking growl inches behind him, Garrus jumped and pissed all over the floor causing him to curse wildly. He found himself in a rather compromising position where on one hand there was an unknown behind him, but on the other he really couldn't stop peeing. It was a turian biological thing.

Feeling something ram against his leg, Garrus decided that his life was not worth a little embarrassment. Half yelling as he fell, he turned and tried to grab whatever it was that had attacked him and was rewarded with a wet sloppy lick from a giant tongue. The foul smell that assaulted his nose elicited more cursing as the turian struggled to get out from beneath his attacker. After a few moments he managed to wrestle the beast off him and got a good look at it.

"Urz?!" The giant wide eyed male alpha varren grinned back up at Garrus with its oversized toothy maw. The animal rolled onto its back with its massive tongue lolling out of its mouth, obviously demanding a belly rub. How in the hell did Wrex's favorite pet varren end up on the Normandy?

Covered in varren slobber and his own urine, Garrus shook his head and stumbled away from the animal, noting that it was in fact chained to the bathroom stall. Swearing under his breath and ignoring the pitiful whimpers coming from the vicious animal, he limped over to the sink to try to clean himself up a little.

Splashing water on himself, he took a moment to use some of the liquid to rinse his face as well. Glancing up at his reflection, Garrus let loose a screech of shock. While he had never been particularly fond of his clan markings, he had nonetheless diligently drawn the ritualistic symbols that marked his family of origins on his face every day. Those same blue markings were now gone, replaced by a giant blue handprint that seemed to cover the entirety of his face. A five fingered hand to be exact.

Cursing loudly, Garrus rubbed his face vigorously with more water, but much to his dismay the paint of the new marking was the semi-permanent sorts. Turians who didn't want to waste time brushing on their clan markings every day used the more lasting brands that took a couple of weeks to fade and only needed a bit of touching up in order to keep up appearances. And now it looked like he would be stuck with a giant handprint on his face for the next few days at the very least.

Swearing some more, he decided there wasn't much he could do about it and instead headed back out of the restroom, hoping to find someone who would have the answers. Upon exiting, he returned to the mess hall where he had first woken up and found that there were two individuals who had made their way there as well. One was the familiar form of Zaeed Massani, who currently had on a more haggard looking face than usual with his battered and outdated assault rifle in hand pointed at a skinny batarian who had his hands up in the air.

"Wait don't shoot!" cried the batarian as he raised his hands up further, just in case Zaeed had somehow missed that.

"How the hell did you get on the Normandy you four eyes squint?" demanded Zaeed with a menacing growl.

"There's no need to be offensive! You were the ones who took my contract! They told me there would be no personal harm coming to me when I signed that indentured servant contract!"

"Wait what?" said Garrus. "When the hell did we get an indentured servant?"

Glancing up at Garrus, Zaeed did a double take. "The hell happen to your face Archangel?"

"That's what I want to know!"

"Look," said the batarian, "could you please put the gun down? This is seriously stressing me out here man!"

With a final menacing grunt the old merc stowed the rifle, though the scowl aimed at the batarian might as well have been an armed weapon in itself. "Alright four eyes, start talking. Who the hell are you and how the fuck did you get on the Normandy?"

"Look, like I said, you guys took my indentured servant contract. They told me there can be no violence against me or anything done against my will! I still have rights!"

Rubbing his forehead, Garrus fought back a surge of nausea. Plopping himself down on one of the uncomfortably designed mess hall seats, the former cop took a deep breath to push back the bile working its way steadily up his throat before speaking.

"Alright I know things got kind of tense for a moment, but no one's going to hurt anyone."

"Speak for yourself! The squint here better have a goddamn good reason to be here or he's leaving in pieces!"

Shooting a glare at Zaeed, Garrus turned back to the frightened looking batarian. "Alright let's start with something simple. What do we call you?"

Still looking shaken, the batarian continued to eye Zaeed nervously. "Bob."

Exchanging an incredulous look with Zaeed, Garrus felt his headache double in strength. "No seriously, work with me here. What's your name?"

"It's Bob alright!" snapped the batarian. "Part of the clause you put into my contract before you paid for my release was that I had to change my name legally to Bob! It's not like I like that stupid human name, but I can get in real big trouble if I violate my contract and get reported!"

Exchanging another look with Zaeed, and fighting back the urge to bang his head against the table, Garrus blew out a breath before continuing.

"Alright Bob, so we bought your indentured servant contract. What happened after?"

"Well you, the human here and the drell were obviously piss roaring drunk out of your minds, but the money checked out so I was released into your custody. You guys brought me back here and pretty much passed out right after."

"You seen Krios yet? The fucking lizard has photographic memory right? Maybe he can tell us what the hell happened last night," grunted Zaeed as he plopped down into the chair opposite of the turian.

A soft groan was heard from beneath the table and the two men slid their chair back to find the ship's master assassin curled up beneath their feet.

"Thane, you alright?" asked Garrus with concern as he noted how pale the drell looked.

"Need water," the assassin croaked.

"Batarian!" barked Zaeed. "Make yourself useful and get us a goddamn glass of water!"

"I have a name!"

"Right, Bob, go get us a goddamn glass of water!"

Muttering batarian curses underneath his breath, the four eye alien moved towards the kitchen in search of a glass and water.

Helping Thane out from beneath the table, Garrus set the man up in a chair besides him, noting how the drell's eyes were unusually light colored.

"Thane, do you remember what happened last night?"

The drell placed his head on the table, using his hands to cover his head and block out the light. "Don't remember."

"I thought you had goddamn photographic memory Krios?!"

"Can't remember what you didn't consciously experience."

"Lot of goddamn use you are," grumbled Zaeed. Turning to face Bob who was rummaging through a cupboard, the merc grimaced. "Get me a glass of water too! And one for the Turian as well!"

Garrus frowned as he wracked his brain for any clue as to what had taken place prior to waking up, but again he drew a blank. "Is anyone else on board?"

"Hell if I know, EDI!" shouted Zaeed, his overly loud voice causing both aliens to wince. "Who else is on board the goddamn ship?"

The display podium where EDI usually manifested herself flashed a bright yellow and the three found themselves staring at a giant holographic smiley face.

"Actualmente no existe nadie más a bordo Sr. Massani."

The gibberish the AI spouted was incomprehensible to Garrus's translator, but judging from the look of disbelief on Zaeed's face the merc had some inkling of what she said.

"Why in the hell are you speaking in Spanish EDI? And what the fuck happened to your display?"

"Español? Interesante, parece que alguien ha reprogramado mis programas auditivos sin que yo lo supiera."

"Ok this is getting us nowhere," Garrus snapped impatiently. "We need to find the rest of the crew and figure out what the hell happened last night. Last thing I remember was that we landed on Illium after we got back through the Omega 4 Relay and we were meeting up with Liara who was financing our R and R."

"It appears that we may have gotten into a celebratory mood."

The simple deadpan way that the assassin spoke even through his obvious pain garnered looks of incredulity from his two crewmates.

"Celebratory mood?" demanded Zaeed. "I woke up feeling like Grunt decided to sit on my goddamn head all night! Haven't gotten this drunk since after finishing up a contract on Canis back in '32, hellava fight."

"Look, this isn't getting us anywhere. I'm going to try to contact the others and see where they're at," grumbled Garrus.

Turning to his omni tool, he punched up a connection to John, but after getting the busy tone for half a minute he gave up. Next he hit up Tali, but got a "this line is no longer in use" message much to his disbelief. Running down the list of Normandy's crew members, he eventually gave up when no one picked up.

"Well that went well," snorted Zaeed.

"I don't see you coming up with anything better," Garrus growled while shooting the merc a heated glare.

"Yeah here's better," grunted the merc as he accepted a glass of water from Bob who placed two more on the table in front of Garrus and the still facedown Thane. "Let's check our pockets."

"Our pockets? That's your big plan?"

The disbelieving look from Garrus at the moment could have wiped out the existence of the reapers.

"Yeah our goddamn pockets. First damn rule of waking up after being black out drunk! See what shit you managed to pick up over the night and trace back your steps with that."

Raising a brow plate, Garrus couldn't find any argument against the merc's logic. "That's…that's actually not a bad idea."

Ignoring Zaeed's snide comments about his prior profession as a detective and his mother's questionable fidelity, Garrus began rummaging through his armor's pockets and spare compartments. A handful of heat sinks, a credit chit, an empty plastic condom wrapper (huh seems he might have gotten lucky last night), a combat knife that most certainly wasn't his, some more heat sinks and… a receipt?

Pulling up the little piece of printout, he squinted at the tiny font. "Huh, it seems we bought 16 crates of beer, 4 of it being dextro and 6 pounds of red sand along with a new microwave?"

"Well I know where the hell the beer went," grunted Zaeed as he too rifled through his pockets.

"The hell?" Sparing a look up from the receipt, Garrus choked back a laugh at the sight of a perplexed Zaeed holding onto what was most definitely a turian dildo, though the proportions were simply ludicrous. At that size the poor male would probably pass out from blood loss to his brain every time he got excited around a female.

"Didn't know you had a taste for turian males there Zaeed. That why you always eyeballing me? Cause I'm a lady's man just so you know."

Snorting the merc tossed the sex toy aside. "Real goddamn funny. Krios, look through your goddamn pockets will you?"

Thane who had finally lifted his head up to guzzle down the glass of water in front of him sighed but did as his teammate bade.

Garrus rubbed at his head and idly noted that Bob had disappeared from the mess hall. Just as well, that was one headache he didn't not want to deal with at the moment.

"Hmm it would appear that I have a contract of some sorts on my person."

Glancing at the puzzled drell, Garrus blinked in surprise at the rather thick wad of paper the assassin was currently frowning at.

"That's a rather official looking document there. What the hell did we sign?"

"It would appear that this is a contract for Fornax, signed by one Garrus Vakarian and Tali Zorah vas Normandy."

Both Zaeed and Garrus had been in the middle of draining their cups and simultaneously spat out the water in their mouths, and in the human's case snorting it out his nose as well.

"What?!" shouted Garrus after his coughing fit had finally died down. Thane was not known for his sense of humor which had Garrus more than a bit worried at hearing that he and one of his best friends had signed a contract together with a company well known for producing sleazy interspecies pornography.

"Yes, the contents of this contract are rather in depth, but basically you both agreed to costar in a four series erotic film titled, Normandy: Tasting the Forbidden Fruits."

Ignoring Zaeed's howls of laughter, Garrus snatched the contract out of the assassin's hands and perused through the contents himself, feeling a sickening pit of dread build up in his stomach. Thane had not been joking.

"Hmm it appears that I have a holodisc on my person as well. It seems that you two might have already shot the first part of the series…"

Contract forgotten, Garrus lunged towards the assassin trying to snatch the holodisk out of his hands but the drell deftly backed away.

"Give me that!"

"Control yourself Garrus! This may be the only evidence we have of what happened!"

While two aliens wrestled over the disk, the lone human at the table picked up the contract to read for himself. He let loose a low whistle as he found the part that indicated how much they had been paid.

"Damn Vakarian, seems you and Zorah bagged half a million creds each for shooting this thing. And a 5% cut of all future profits on the series."

The disk finally broke as Garrus toppled out of his chair and onto the fragile video unit. Thane straightened himself up as the livid turian picked himself off the floor.

"What you go and do that for Vakarian? I wanted to see what Zorah looked like without her suit on!" snickered Zaeed, getting heated glare from Garrus.

"Don't you fucking talk about Tali like that!" snarled Garrus. The turian could feel heat slowly creep up his neck at the mercenary's leering. Spirits! Had he and Tali really…? Well it might explain the condom wrapper in his pocket. Seating himself and burying his face in his hands, he wondered how long it would be before Tali hunted him down and blew his sorry ass apart with her shotgun. He'd probably deserve it this time.

"Hmm it would also appear that we sold Jacob to slavers as well."

"What?!"

Peeking out between his talons, Garrus saw that Thane was holding another receipt in his hands trademark frown on his face.

"To Bloodpack mercenaries to be exact. For 10,000 creds. Perhaps this is where we got the money to buy off Bob's contract," mused Thane with a thoughtful look on his face.

Garrus sighed and let his aching head hit the cool table. He was never going to drink again.

TBC…maybe

**AN: Yeah humor muse has been quiet lately, but here's a thought haha. Maybe I'll continue on it if people like it, so let me know what you guys think. Inspiration partly from the Hangover movies, though I have never seen any of them.**


	9. It's a tradition

**AN: Huh, so warmer reception than expected for Waking Sober, guess this means I'm gonna actually have to figure out a plot *stresssssss* haha well should be fun. Anyways no promises on how long that's going to take cause humor just sorta hits me rather than me brilliantly coming up with it by sitting down. In the meantime here are some of my in class doodles that I polished up a bit to tide you over until I figure out where to go with my mini plot. **

James Vega liked to think he was a relatively well traveled and open minded individual. He had seen more of the galaxy than most. He had interacted with just about every other sentient species out there, and few that weren't. True, most of those interactions had involved killing said aliens, but nonetheless he was no wide eyed country bumpkin out on his first tour of the galaxy.

Still, living on a ship with aliens was a novel experience. It opened up all new avenues of confusion over the practices of other species that lived out there and often in ways that simply plain bewildered the poor marine. For example, at the moment he was banging on the doorway to the gun battery with a meaty fist, trying to get his hands on a module that was needed for the spectre missiles targeting matrix, but the Normandy's resident turian was refusing him entry.

"Open up Scars! I need those modules if you want the Normandy to be able to spit missiles at the Reapers."

"Yeah right! You won't get me that easily Vega! I know what you're up to! Real clever John, but you're not getting me that easy! Not this time!" The flanged voice was muffled through the doorway, but even through half a foot of steel James could make out the undercurrents of hysterical laughter.

"Scars you drunk in there or something?"

"Fuck you Vega! I have a Mantis loaded with concussive rounds and I'm not afraid to use it!"

Raising an eyebrow, he turned to exchange a curious look with Tali who had left the dining area to investigate the commotion. In fact it seemed half the personal on the Crew Quarter deck was crowding in behind them.

"Garrus, what's gotten into you, you big boshtet?" Tali rested a hand on her hip while she glared at the doorway as if the turian would be able to feel it if her gaze was fierce enough.

"Tali you're in on this too?! You traitor! How could you?!"

"Scars what the hell are you talking about?" shouted James in exasperation.

"You think I don't know?! Not this year! You won't get me this year! I'm ready! Anyone who comes through this door is eating a concussive round!"

"Garrus we have no idea what you're talking about!" growled Tali as she flicked out her omnitool and began to override the automatic doors. The red holographic display on the doorway began to flicker between green and red like an out of control traffic light.

Eyeing the doorway wearily, James backed up from the quarian who was furiously tapping away on her handheld interface. "Ugh Sparks, I think he's being serious about the whole concussive round thing."

"Let that big blue boshtet try! I'll hack is visor to play nothing but hanar porn for a month after I shove Chickatee up his skinny armored ass!"

"Don't do it Tali!" Garrus must have come closer to the door because his voice was much clearer even over the confused murmurs of the crowd. "I'm serious! I'll shoot!"

Lowering her omnitool, Tali gave the doorway a good smack. "What the hell are you talking about?!"

"Are you serious Tali? You really don't know?"

"Know what you stupid boshtet?!"

"It's the first day of the fourth month of the human calendar! Don't you remember?!"

The crowd murmured in confusion as James turned the phrase over in his head. Snorting in disbelief, the marine crossed his large arms as he stepped up behind Tali once more.

"You're throwing a big fuss over April Fools? Geez Scars I thought you were indoctrinated for a moment!"

Tali raised both hands and began banging on the doorway.

"Garrus! Open up! You have to let me in! They're behind me!" she shrieked, flailing her limbs wildly against the metal frame.

Shooting the suddenly frantic quarian an alarmed look, James raised his hands up placidly. "Whoa, whoa, Sparks what the hell's gotten into you?"

"Stay back!" shrieked the Admiral, raising her omnitool which was crackling ominously. "I've got an overload set to cripple a krogan on this thing! Garrus let me in!"

"I'm sorry Tali, I can't risk it!"

"You Boshtet open the hell up!"

Now completely bewildered, James backed up away from the quarian who had her back to the doorway with her omnitool waving in front of her as if to ward off the crowd of befuddled humans. With a few final bangs, Tali gave up and instead lowered her shoulder and blitzed through the crowd sending people stumbling in all directions.

Scratching his head and watching the normally cool headed quarian bolt off for the elevator while laughing maniacally, James wondered what he had missed.

"What the hell was that all about?" he grumbled as the confused crowd behind him picked themselves up with angry mutters.

"I believe I can shed some light on Garrus and Tali's reaction." Edi's synthetic voice from the speakers startled the marine. It was easy to forget that EDI was practically omnipresent on the Normandy now that she had a mobile platform.

"What do you mean?"

"April fools was first introduced to the alien crew members who served on the Normandy SR1. From what Jeff told me and the databases I have been able to access, it got quite out of hand. The tradition was continued on the SR2 where I bore witness to the event. It was truly something to behold. It is not surprising that Garrus and Tali have such an adverse reaction to this occasion. To an organic mind, it was no doubt quite traumatizing."

"How bad could it have possibly been?"

"Urdnot Grunt ended up sold to the Batarian Hegemony and spent 17 hours in a slave holding pen on Omega before a rescue operation was launched. Operative Taylor was marauded in an escape pod on an inhospitable planet for two days with no clothing before he was retrieved. Justicar Samara almost lost her title as a justicar due to indecent public exposure while intoxicated. Yeoman Chambers lost 100% of all hair follicles. Those are examples of some of the more tame pranks that had befallen the crew."

Eyebrows having nearly shot of his face as he listened to EDI's recall, James couldn't help but shiver slightly.

"Wow you guys really took April Fools seriously on the Normandy."

"You are mistaken. The crew did not willingly partake in these events."

"What?"

"Shepard single handedly pulled off each individual prank by himself."

"You're kidding."

"His skills as an N7 infiltrator was no doubt invaluable. Even I was not exempt from his machinations."

"What did he manage to do to an AI with no body?" James asked, disbelief coloring his voice. He knew Loco was good, but no one was that good.

"I would rather not talk about it. Logging you off."

Shocked by EDI's abrupt dismissal, James missed the sound of footsteps coming up behind him.

"James, suit up! We're going groundside."

Nearly jumping out of his skin, the lieutenant whirled around and faced his commander with wide eyes.

"Uh, yes sir!"

Snapping a quick jerky salute, the big marine began to edge around the commander, keeping his eyes on the man at all times. John watched with furrowed eyebrows as the big soldier practically ran away from him.

What the hell was that all about?

"Garrus! Grab your gear! We're going groundside!"

Flinching back from the keening wail coming through the doorway, the commander did a double take as the sound died down into panic-stricken sobs.

"Garrus! Are you alright in there?!"

**AN: Yeah thought I'd give the april fools things go, cliché I know lol **


	10. SSV Loveboat

**AN: Short work I did a while back, let me know what you guys thing. Working on the Waking Sober continuation.**

**Dirty Reid: Thanks for the review, and I'm open to idea suggestions if you guys have anything you want to see. No promises I'll go through with it, and no promises that if I do it will come out the way you think ;p though of course I'll be sure to give credit to anyone's idea I hijack for my own use!**

"I'm telling you doc, the Normandy's turning into a goddamn circus!" Zaeed complained loudly as he gouged out another spoonful of freeze dried mashed potatoes.

Swallowing the mess with a grimace he took a deep gulp from his cup to wash the horrible concoction down. Dr. Chakwas observed the mercenary with amusement over the rim of her own cup.

"Shepard's always been prone to collecting odd individuals for his groundside team, it's hardly surprising Zaeed."

Snorting the long time merc waved his plastic disposable spork at the elderly doctor.

"The aliens ain't nothing new; I made my name carving my way through the Terminus Systems love, I've probably worked with more aliens then humans at this point."

"Then what's the problem?"

"Problem? I'll tell you the problem! We're a boat full of some of the galaxy's best professional killers and mass murderers, and I've never seen a bigger pack of unprofessional ruffians!"

"Come now Zaeed, I know some of members can be eccentric…"

"Eccentric?! Hell I don't mind the weird ass alien ritual shit; I'm talking about the high school drama we got going on here! You got the robot following the quarian around like a lost puppy; thing probably has a crush on her but just don't have the processor to figure it out. Zorah's got her glowing eyes set on the turian in the gun battery who's been glancing at the thief when he thinks no one is looking. Kas sneaks in to watch Taylor strip down and shower and take shits, and the armorer's still holding a torch for the XO who's making cow eyes at Shepard. The assassin and asari have been spending some quality "meditating" time together, and the krogan's finally figure out how to choke the chicken."

The old merc grimaced as he recalled the noise from the night before he had tried valiantly to ignore.

"Fuck I can hear him going at it at night and I'm on the other half of the engineering bay! Zero and Chambers are off didlying each other down in engineering every evening, and the pilot's AI secretly spying on them feeding him footage so he can go wank in the cockpit. Mordin's the only one not in on this ship wide orgy, and that's cause he don't have no goddamn sex drive! I mean seriously, this is the crew that's supposed to take down the collectors?! Shit I should go put up some holo's. Reality shows got nothing on the Normandy! I'd make a killing on the net. The asari would eat this shit right up!"

"You're exaggerating," laughed the Normandy's doctor. "And Kelly is down giving psychological counseling for Jack, not whatever wild imaginings you came up with."

"Ha! Is that what kids call it nowadays? Well in that case I could use some good psychological counseling myself doc," said Zaeed as he leered at the amused woman across from him.

The steel haired woman chuckled as she set her cup down on a coaster. "I think you're just feeling a bit left out Zaeed. I mean-"

At that moment muffled shouting could be heard from the closed doors of the gun battery. Both the mercenary and the doctor paused and turned curious glances down the short walkway that lead up to the door that had a flashing red closed mark on it. A second later the hologram turned green and Garrus stumbled out of it before the automatic doors slammed shut and flashed an angry red.

What made the experience completely surreal for the two observers was the fact that Garrus was completely naked. The turian who normally strutted about the Normandy in his scarred heavy armor covering everything but his face currently had nothing on at all, not even a hand piece to cover his crotch. The alien slammed his fist against the door and shouted something unintelligible through it, but got no response. With as much dignity as a naked man could muster, Garrus turned about and stormed past the dining area headed for the bunks, ignoring the two humans.

After blinking a couple of times, Zaeed snorted with a shake of his head. "You see what I'm saying?! I'm getting way too old to deal with this shit."

A sultry smile crossed the doctor's face. "Really now? Even if I were to offer some personal psychological counseling in my med bay?"

Eyebrows shot up over mismatched eyes.

"That a real offer doc or you just teasing an old man?"

Chuckling again the doctor go up from her seat and entered her office. Zaeed's eyes tracked the woman's progress until she was inside, feeling his heart hammering at a rate even a firefight couldn't trigger anymore. The clear windows of the med bay turned dark indicating she had turned on the privacy mode that was meant for when the doctor wanted to do a more thorough physical examination of a crew member.

Feeling a smirk tug at his lips, he dropped the plastic utensil down onto the mostly eaten tray. Either he was about to make a complete horse's ass of himself, or this mission was about to get a lot more interesting. Getting up, the mercenary was startled by another scuffle, this one coming from the XO's office. Turning, he caught sight of a half-dressed Shepard stumbling out of the woman's room with only one boot on.

Straightening up, the hero of the Battle of Citadel turned and caught Zaeed's eye. The mercenary cocked an eyebrow, smirking as he watched the commander's neck glow an alarming shade of red.

"Uh..evening Zaeed."

"Evening Shepard. Been busy going over battle plans with Lawson I see."

If possible the man's neck burned even brighter. Without a word the commander did an about face and headed for the elevator. Heart still thundering in his chest, Zaeed made a beeline for the med bay. Time to go get some psychological counseling from the good doctor.

**AN: read a short fiction out there of Zaeed trying to seduce Chakwas, so here's my tribute to that!**


	11. Real men keep a diary

AN: I should really be working on a research project but I just can't work up the huzzah to go do it. So here's the next chapter. You can all thank ** .1656.** 10 reviews from one person can really get the inspiration going =) so props to you whoever you are! This chapter's dedicated to you!

**The camera shook for a moment before settling down and focusing in on the person sitting on the armless chair. The dark toned skin of the man contrasted greatly with the bright lighting of the room, and his stoic appearance was accented by the equally dark uniform he wore, a monotone black that was interrupted infrequently by trims of gold. A gloomy scowl resonated on his otherwise handsome face and he cleared his throat before speaking.**

"**It's not easy being on the Normandy. I've never been comfortable working for Cerberus, even if they're the ones getting it done, it just don't feel right you know? But they brought Shepard back and now we're actually doing something about the abducted colonists so I guess I shouldn't be complaining…"**

**He raised a hand and rubbed the back of his neck. **

"**But yeah not exactly digging it here, especially with the ground crew Shepard's brought on board. It ain't cause they're alien…just…well they're fucking alien. And I don't mean like wrong species alien, but like the wrong side of sanity alien."**

_The elevator doorway parted and a furious looking Zaeed marched into the mess hall with a gun in hand. A single shot was fired into the ceiling, but luckily the reinforced hull held up against the small arms fire. Mess Sargent Rupert's pot of roast beef stew was not so sturdy judging by the way it shattered from the ricochet. The deafening discharge from the Carnifex pistol scared the hell out of the occupants eating, though the reaction from the present groundside team was rather telling._

_Garrus was on his feet with a razor sharp eight inch talon in one hand and a half eaten drumstick of some exotic turian equivalent of game quail in the other, wide reptilian eyes darting about looking for a target. Thane had a Phalenx pistol unholstered, though where on his skintight leather armor he managed to hide that without anyone noticing was a mystery. Kasumi had ghosted into stealth mode before the occupants had even left their seats and the discrete opening and closing of the medical bay door hinted at her current location. Miranda had thrown her chair back with a biotic pulse that still cloaked around her lithe form in blazing halo of blue death like some Amazonian war goddess. Grunt had shattered his chair on the table and held two of the legs in front of him like clubs, a half chewed piece of varren steak hanging out of his mouth with a confused but ready to kill someone look on his face._

"_Alright!" bellowed Zaeed, causing the noncombatants of the room to jump again. "WHO TOUCHED JESSIE? WHO TOUCHED MY FUCKING GUN?!"_

_**Jacob sighed and ran a hand down his face. "I mean don't get me wrong, they're good people to have at your back in a fight. But outside of one?"**_

"_Cheerleader, I don't care if you're fucking Shepard, if you touch me one more time I will fucking throw you out of the goddamn air car!" The glare the convict sent the XO who was practically sitting in her lap could have blown the shuttle out of the sky._

"_If you haven't noticed, it's a little crowded in here Jack. I'm not exactly invading your private space because I enjoy it. God, when was the last time you showered woman? _

"_Bitch what did you just say?!" snarled Jack._

"_Don't worry too much about it Jack. You humans all smell a little off to a turian." The dual flanged comment from Garrus was met with pissed off looks from every human in the compact compartment that currently sat twelve, about four over the recommended occupant limit in the Kodiak though it was doable._

"_What the hell is that supposed to mean?" snapped the normally happy Kasumi. Her current mood was due to the fact that some unknown perpetrator had gone and drunk up her stock of expensive alcohol dry while she had been out stalking Jacob in the workout room late last night. Either it was someone from the ship crew, or somebody on the groundside team could hide the mother of all hangovers like no one's business. She was not happy to be on the other end of a theft._

"_Back me up here Grunt. Most the humans smell weird don't they?" asked Garrus._

_The genetically perfect Krogan who might have been mildly claustrophobic as a side effect of having been stuck in a tube for most of his early conscious years looked decidedly unsettled being crowded by his teammates._

"_You all smell like ass and meat to me," he grumbled while eyeballing the emergency exit handle. To do or not to do? Sure Shepard might shoot him in the head, but he could probably regenerate from that and it might be worth it to get some breathing space…._

_As the humans on the cramped shuttle muttered unkind things about their resident turian that ranged from the questionable fidelity of his mother to the laughable size of his genitals, Samara raised her hands to try to calm her fellow crewmates. "Peace, we are amongst friends here."_

"_Blue bitch, just to clarify here, but cheerleader bitch here is not my friend," snorted Jack. Turbulence struck the air car at the exact moment, sending her tumbling face first into Miranda's lap._

"_Who's on who now bitch?" simpered the XO with a smug look on her face while she examined her nails._

_As the convict wrestled herself back into a seated position with a scowl on her face, Zaeed let loose a wolf whistle while smirking a shit eating grin. _

"_Shit's getting real now, no need to hold back on our account here ladies." The scarred merc nudged Jacob with his elbow causing the dark skinned man to roll his eyes._

_The two women spared each other a look before flipping the merc off in sync._

"_Samara, are you alright? You look decidedly paler than usual," said a concerned Thane who had held his peace up until now. "Perhaps you should sit this mission out."_

_The Justicar coughed into her hand before speaking in a slightly rasping tone. "No, I am well. Simply a mild disturbance in sleep last night."_

"_Yeah, Samara, you don't look too well." Kasumi narrowed her eyes underneath her shaded hood as the gears in her head turned. "In fact, you look like someone who's had a little too much to drink…" _

_The already stiff posture of the Justicar stiffened further if possible. "The code does not allow the consumption of alcoholic beverages."_

"_Biometric scans of Samara Justicar is 99.8% consistent with symptoms of alcoholic overloading in Asari physiology," buzzed Legion from his corner of the shuttle next to the doorway, plunging the shuttle into a deafening silence. "We do not understand the purpose of your deceitful statement."_

"_Bitch it was you!" screeched the Japanese thief as the smaller woman lunged across the shuttle compartment at the Asari._

_Jacob attempted to grab her but only managed to palm her backside as she clawed her way forward and received a kick to the face for his efforts. As he flailed out he struck Zaeed who had his mattock rifle in hand, causing the man to accidently pull the trigger on his rifle which luckily only had a concussive shot loaded in. _

_The nonlethal payload discharged with a thunderous roar in the small compartment, instantly knocking out Jack and Miranda who were unfortunate enough to be the closest to the impact point. The entire craft jolted wildly from the discharge from Zaeed's rifle, causing the handheld display Mordin had been pursuing while valiantly trying to ignore his shipmate's conversation to fly out of his hands and smacking into Garrus's targeting visor. The eyepiece which was pretty much an extension of the turian discharged an electrical payload as it overloaded from the impact, sending Garrus into a fit of twitches as his muscles all clenched wildly from the phantom electrical impulse being sent through his nervous system._

_Tali attempted to unbuckle herself from her seat to help the seizing turian, but was beaten to it by Grunt who had struggled out of his harness and managed to make it onto his feet even in the wildly bucking craft._

"_I AM KROGAN!" the young warrior bellowed as he lunged for the exit handle of the Kodiak._

"_GRUNT! NO!"_

**By now Jacob had his face in both hands. "Who am I kidding? There's not a normal person on this crew. I don't know how the hell Shepard puts up with them all."**

**The subtle sound of the hiss of automatic door parting caused Jacob to look up. **

"**Jacob what's going on?" The person speaking was off camera.**

"**Not much, just doing my daily video diary." Jacob had managed to plaster a smile onto his face as he spoke, none of his earlier darkened mood evident.**

"**Really? I didn't know you had one."**

"**Yeah, just a little something I do on the side. Keep my thoughts on record."**

"**That's good, that's good. We all gotta find a way to destress you know?"**

"**Yeah I hear you Shepard."**

"**Well listen man, I've got a slight situation brewing down in engineering. I think Grunt got into Jack's secret stash of chocolate again. I could use some muscle if you're in."**

"**I'm your man."**

"**Alright, well I'm going to go round up Garrus and a few others. Meet us down in the mess hall."**

"**You got it Shepard."**

**The telltale swish of the automatic door signaled the commander's exit, and the smile on Jacob's face vanished with him. Turning the armory officer sent the camera a deadpan expression.**

"**Looks like Grunt's at it again. If you're watching this, then it probably means I didn't make it back from engineering. I'd just like to go on record and say, fuck everybody on the Normandy, fuck Cerberus and fuck the Illusive Man. In fact, fuck the Illusive man, his shoes, his haircut and his brand of underwear. Fuck them all."**

AN: Let me know what you guys think


	12. A job you love isn't work

AN: Saw an ad and couldn't help myself, cookie for the first one who recognizes it. I had originally intended to use Thane, but Garrus was just too good to pass up.

**Dark unblinking reptilian eyes that seemed to stare into the void itself focused on the center of the camera shot as if they could see the audience. The male turian sat with a perfectly erect posture, his hands folded in his lap while he pondered his words. There was not much else to see in the background, just a massive gun battery that would mean little to someone who's never seen one before. The lighting was dim, one would have to struggle to see anything inside without resorting to squinting, but the turian didn't appear bothered.**

**After a long moment of silence, he finally cleared his throat and began speaking in a low rasping dual harmonic tone that would have sent a human woman's uterus skipping.**

"**Being a sniper…it's a good job. Its challenging work and you're guaranteed to never go hungry. At the end of the day, as long as there are still two people left in the galaxy…someone will want someone else dead."**

The scope zoomed into the unsuspecting Blue Sun's head, the man oblivious to the fact that his life was about to be cut abruptly short.

"Steady…Steady…" Garrus whispered to himself as he waited for the perfect shot. Timing was the key here. It was what separated a mediocre sniper from a great one.

Two steps to the left and the merc was lined up with another unwary Blue Sun. A quick twitch of his finger and the Widow spat out a single round that punched through both men's skulls, ending their lives in the span of seconds.

"Boom!" crowed the Turian as he reloaded his rifle. "Headshot!"

"**My parents?" Garrus shifted uncomfortably in the seat that had obviously not been designed with turian physiology in mind. "They were not happy with my decision to go to Omega."**

Garrus sighed for the umpteenth time as he held the receiver a few inches away from his face while he listened to his father rant, idly wondering how long the man could yell without taking a breath. Honestly, only on Omega would you find a communication hub that had no video outlet and still used a receiver of all things.

"I will not have my son running about as some…some…crazed gunman!" shouted his father.

"I'm not a crazed gunman dad, I'm an assassin!" growled Garrus back, exasperation all but evident if anyone could see his body posture at the moment. "What's the difference?! The difference is one's a professional job; the other's a mental sickness!"

Pausing to listen to his father rant some more, Garrus sighed. "Dad…dad…dad just put mom on the phone!"

"**Omega…Omega was something else. You can't describe it in words. It's the very essence of the place, it gets to you. Seeps under your plates and changes you. You get meaner every day, and before you know it you look in a mirror and you don't recognize the man standing there."**

Garrus paused as he panned the sniper rifle that he had zeroed in on the walkway full of Eclipse mercs a floor below his current position.

"Oh crap. Sidonis, I think one of them just spotted me."

An indistinct yell of "Sniper!" in the distance followed by a bullets pinging wildly off the metal pipes the two turians were crouched behind caused both men to duck back into the darkness with haste.

"Yep, definitely saw me."

"**Feelings? Nah I don't let that get to me. I mean feelings are what gets some guys to bludgeon their wives to death with a quasar trophy. Professionals? We have standards." **

**Garrus brought up his hand and began to tick off each digit. "Be polite."**

"Die Motherfucker!" screamed a krogan Bloodpack mercenary as he threw aside his shotgun and barreled towards Garrus like an out of control locomotive.

Snatching his own combat talon from its sheath, the turian vigilante met the krogan's charge head on, but nimbly danced out of the way at the last second. Hooking a spurred foot into the ankle of the rampaging reptile, Garrus sent his adversary crashing to the floor. Leaping on to the downed krogan's back as it tried to struggle to its feet, he drove the eight inch blade into the mercenary's brain, twisting the talon for extra measures.

Standing back up Garrus took a step back from the dead krogan and placed a hand on his chest, reminiscent of a turian salute to a brother in arms that fallen in battle. "Spirits guide you friend."

"**Be efficient."**

Thousands of rounds sprayed out from the most definitely illegal minigun the krogan warlord had toted at his hip. The massive hand held chaingun spat out thermal clips from a belt that fed into the box mechanism, showering the air with live rounds.

"Come out and fight me Archangel!"

Garrus stepped from behind a pillar and lined up his rifle in one smooth motion, sending a bullet through the reptilian alien's eye from almost two hundred meters away. The krogan slumped to the ground, dead from the armor piercing round before his brain even registered.

"Quality over quantity pal!"

"**And plan to kill everyone you meet."**

The bridge was littered with dead bodies. Hundreds of corpses strewn about in a crimson massacre, most having killed by frighteningly precise headshots.

Breathing steadily, Garrus scanned the opposing side of the bridge from the safety of his now dead team's headquarters waiting for some stupid merc to expose too much flesh.

A movement in the corner of the scope caught his eye and he acted out of reflex. The rifle in his hands twitched to the right half an inch and he pulled the trigger without thought.

"Oh my god! Muffin! He just shot my cat! He just shot my fucking cat!" someone shouted from across the bridge.

Whoops.

**Garrus winced slightly and rubbed the back of his neck. "Well maybe not everything."**

**A loud thudding bang echoed in the room causing the turian to look up. **

"**It's open," he shouted.**

**The telltale automatic swish of the doorway was followed by hurried footsteps, though the person remained off camera.**

"**Garrus! Got a crises on my hands here! Grab your gun and meet me in the science wing!"**

"**What?!" spluttered Garrus. "Why the hell do I need a gun on the Normandy?"**

"**Yeah uh…" the commander's tone held a slight sheepish quality to it during the brief pause he tried to find words. "You remember how Mordin insisted we bring the collector drone body back for study?"**

**Garrus's mandibles fluttered slightly in the turian equivalent of flabbergasted. "Let me guess, it's somehow managed to reactivate itself even though we shot it in the head to be safe? Twice?"**

"**Yeah…actually…it's slightly more serious than that."**

"_**How is that even possible?"**_

"**Yeah… uh…Harbinger might have done his little possession trick." The embarrassment from the commander could practically be tasted in the air.**

"…"

"**So yeah, I could really use some backup on this one."**

"…**give me a sec and I'll grab my gun."**

**The doorway closed again signaling the fact that Garrus was once more alone in the gun battery. The camera shot shook wildly as the turian picked up the handheld so that his face completely dominated the view.**

"**Another day on board the illustrious Normandy. I don't know how many stupid situations I've been dragged into because of that human. A sane turian would have left a long time ago. A smart turian would have demanded higher pay. I guess it says a lot about me that I'm back on board a second time without pay. Again. But you know what? I wouldn't trade it for anything in the world."**

**For a moment Garrus's face morphed into a look of nostalgic contemplation. The moment was ruined by the buzzing noise that echoed through the Normandy's overhead comms.**

"**Garrus! Get your bony ass up into the CIC! It's in the fucking armory!" There was a brief pause as gunfire was heard over the comms.**

"_**We are the Harbinger of your destruction!"**_

"**It's going for the god damn Cain!" Jacob's strangled yell through the comms sounded a couple pitches higher than normal**_**.**_

"_**We know you feel this!"**_

**Pinching the bridge of his nose with a heavy sigh, Garrus closed his eyes for a moment before reopening them and making a tsking sound. **

"**If only you could see me now dad," he muttered as he stalked off camera.**

AN: lol more silliness on board the Normandy mixed with guns and explosions.


	13. Waking Sober II

**AN: So, here's part 2 of Waking Sober. It's kinda funny, I was planning and beating my brains out trying to formulate a plot for the past month and was almost done with it before I gave up and restarted from scratch and finished this in one afternoon -.- Maybe I'm just not meant to try to force these things haha. Hope you guys enjoy! Tell me what you think through the review button!**

**EDIT 6/29/13- spelling on Fornax. Special thanks to those who pointed it out!**

Thane Krios realized that he was not a young man anymore. His body while healthy for a man wasting away from a fatal disease simply did not recover the way it used to. Either that or he had a hella lot more to drink the night before than he thought. Being drunk for a drell was an interesting if not absolutely terrifying experience. For a race that had perfect recall, it was frightening to have periods of blank spots in their memory. For other species, it was not uncommon to have trouble recalling the past, or not being able to recall an incident at all. For a drell, the only time they had any lapses in memory was when were unconscious.

The only exception to this was when they were intoxicated. Even if they were taking drugs, the memories would still exist, often just fractured or colored differently than normal. He had once told Shepard of how his body had fallen into battle sleep without his soul there to drive it. That had been more a philosophical way of looking at his sudden departure from contract assassination to personal vengeance against those who had murdered his wife. But when it came to alcohol? There was a name for it amongst his people, the Waking Blackness. Truly then, his body was still moving and functioning, but his mind recalled nothing save darkness.

"Krios, will you stop thinking about the first time you got laid and gear up already?" growled Zaeed. "We're headed out to find the others."

At the man's prompting, unbidden the first time he had taken a female came forward in a haze of confusion and pleasure.

"Her eyes trembled, mouth parted open-"

"Jesus fucking A Christ!" muttered Zaeed as he pushed past the immobile assassin still embroiled in the memory of his first conquest in the bedroom.

"Garrus! Are you fucking done with the batarian yet?!" he barked irritably into the port side cargo hold opposite of his own sleeping space.

"One sec!" came the muffled shout back through the closed door.

Grumbling to himself about not trusting a filthy terrorist on board the Normandy, the old merc marched into Grunt's room to see what the holdup was. He blinked slightly when he found Garrus standing in front of their indentured servant who was currently hogged tied to a wheelie chair that Chambers seemed to love sitting in and rolling about in the mess hall. There was a comical amount of duct tape wrapped around the batarian and his hands had been cocooned together behind his back with the same sticky material as well ensuring that he could not leave the chair.

"This ain't right man!" shouted Bob as Zaeed chuckled at the strange spectacle before him. "This is abuse!"

The turian ignored the batarian's shouts about his rights as an indentured servant and finished filling a class of water which he placed on one of the cargo boxes leveled about waist high, just within reach for the seated batarian. Plucking a pink silly straw that Kasumi seemed to stock en mass in her room into the glass of water, Garrus pulled out a clear package of yellow Twinkies which he placed neatly next to the water.

"Wait a sec, where in the blue hell did you find Twinkies?" demanded Zaeed in disbelief. He hadn't seen one of those snacks since he left Earth more than thirty years ago.

Amazingly enough, the unhealthy artery clogging snack food had defied all expectations and continued production hundreds of years after its conception back at the beginning of the 20th century. Four bankruptcies and six buy ups later and the little yellow snack continued to be produced, though in much lower quantities than back in its heyday. Zaeed had to lick his lips to keep himself from drooling. He could practically taste the sugar bath calling to his taste buds.

"What?" asked the turian distractedly. "I don't know, found it in the kitchen. It was the only edible food in Gardner's pantry. Funny enough, it was tucked in behind the bag of salt."

"Bastard," growled Zaeed as his eyes narrowed. The chef had been holding out on them. He had a god damn Twinkie and didn't share it with his crew mates on a suicide mission? They should have left that no good back stabbing son of a bitch to rot on the collector base. Zaeed conveniently forgot that Gardner had been kidnapped well before they had pursued the collectors through the Omega 4 Relay.

"Hey could you open that for me?" asked Bob tentatively. "I can't exactly chew through the plastic. Our sharp teeth are just for show!"

Zaeed placed an armored boot on the batarians chest, sending the bound man rolling backwards un controllably with a strangled yell before crashing into the wall and almost tipping him over.

"Come on, leave Bob alone," scolded Garrus with a reproachful look. "We got to go find Shepard and the others."

"Right," grunted the old mercenary as he continued to hungrily gaze at the packaged Twinkies.

Following the turian out the doorway, he paused briefly before doubling back and pocketing the small yellow package.

"Oh come on man!"

Stopping again by the doorway at the batarian's protests Zaeed doubled back and drank all the water for good measure.

The doorway shut with a resounding snap leaving Bob alone in the port side cargo hold.

"God, why'd I go to art school? I should have just listened to dad and been a slaver," he muttered miserably. "Things could not get any worst…"

As if universe heard him and wanted to kick him while he was down, the lights turned off at that exact moment, plunging the room into pitch blackness.

"OH COME THE FUCK ON!"

**Outside the Normandy**

The three men blinked owlishly in the evening light. Eyes sensitive from having consumed too much alcohol dilated painfully at the natural rays of Illium's setting sun.

"So where to first?" asked Zaeed while he cursed himself for not thinking to bring sunglasses. He knew Zero had taken a pair off a dead Blue Sun a couple of months back when they had fist picked up Grunt and stashed it away somewhere down in her hidey hole.

"We should probably figure out where Jacob is first," remarked Thane calmly as he reached into his pockets and pulled out the exact pair of sunglasses Zaeed had been thinking about.

"Oh fuck you with a thorny pole Krios," growled the old merc as he watched the drell don the black shades with a sigh of relief.

"Jacob can handle himself, and I'm not sure Shepard wouldn't be too happy if we mounted a rescue operation without him," said Garrus as they began ambling past the walkway towards the business district of the port. "I think we should clear up this Fornax business before we go do anything else."

Zaeed scoffed as they passed through the second decontamination zone. "What are you so worried about there Archangel? Afraid the ladies won't be impressed when they see you on screen?"

"It's not about me!" growled the Turian. "If it were just some random girl I wouldn't give two rats ass who saw it on the net. But Tali is in this mess too! I won't have her paraded through the extranet like some cheap whore cause of some drunken mistake we made!"

"How do you know she wasn't the one who wanted to do it eh?" Zaeed shot back with a snort. "It's always the quiet ones that want to do the freaky shit. Why I remember a couple years back on Omega there was this one asari xenobiologist who wanted me to bend her over a varren in front of Aria while-"

"I agree with Garrus," interrupted Thane before that particular story could get too detailed.

"Thank you!"

"Even if Tali were not angry at the outcome, Commander Shepard would be most displeased if he were to find out," said the drell assassin. "It would perhaps be best if we took care of this without his knowledge."

The three men paused in their step as they thought about what Thane had brought up and exchanged nervous looks. Shepard treated Tali practically like his own baby sister. Ever since he had saved her from the alleyway in the Wards he had watched out for her and had stepped in whenever he felt things got too rough regardless of the fact that she could take care of herself better than most. A turian security guard on Noveria had discovered that the hard way when he suddenly found himself dangling from one foot upside down over a four story drop after he had muttered a racial slur at the quarian when they had walked past him.

"Yeah," said Zaeed slowly, "maybe we should clear that up before we find Shepard."

He didn't fancy being in Garrus's shoes if the commander found out what the turian had done to his adoptive quarian sister.

"We can go hunt down Jacob after. Once we know his location, we'll go grab Shepard and we can storm the place." Garrus spoke with conviction, but inside he was wondering who was going to kill him first, Shepard or Tali. Maybe they'd do it together. It'd be something they could bond over, he thought miserably.

"The headquarters of Fornax is a twenty minute drive by air car," Thane announced as he examined a map in front of a taxi terminal. "Since you did sign a contract with Miss Zorah, perhaps it would be wise to go see your asari information broker friend first. She would be able to examine the contract and see if there is any way to get you out of it."

Garrus shook his head furiously while raising both hands in front of him in an X shaped warding motion. "What are you crazy?! She'd tear me a new asshole with a warp if she found out! No way, if you're going to take this to Liara I might as well go tell Shepard and get it over with. At least he'd probably just shoot me instead of flaying me alive with her mind!"

"So what are we gonna do? A drive by snatch and grab?" asked Zaeed. There was a dangerous if not slightly demented gleam in the man's one organic eye. "Storm in wave our guns around and demand they hand over the master copies and erase their database with a few well-placed gun shots?"

"No, nobody's going to die over this Zaeed. We're just going to go in and have a chat with the manager and clear this mess up," Garrus stubbornly insisted.

"You sure? I got some spare thermite grenades that would look real scary if I lit it up and melted a hole in the floor or something. I'm sure between you, me and Krios we'd be able to pull it off without anyone getting shot. Fatally anyways."

Garrus paused in consideration for a brief moment as an air car descended to their position. "Keep those thermites handy."

"Now we're talking."

The two men turned to enter the taxi only to see that Thane had drifted away to a public display terminal that ran news and other televised garbage 24/7 on Illium's public settings.

"Thane, get in the car. We're leaving!" shouted Garrus.

Seeing that the assassin wasn't budging, the two men moved over to his side.

"Thane, come on!" growled Zaeed impatiently as he closed in on the drell.

"I think I might have discovered part of what we did last night," mumbled Thane , uncertainty coloring his scratchy voice.

As the two men finally turned to the screen they felt their own respective jaws drop at the video being played silently in the background as a human and asari bantered on screen.

"_And just what do we have here Jalene?"_

"_Well it seems someone caught footage of Commander Shepard and the Normandy crew out celebrating last night in the Eternal Embrace, one of our biggest hot spots on Illium."_

"_Indeed it would seem that once more Commander Shepard has managed to become another viral video sensation on the extranet, though I have to say who would have thought he had it in him?"_

"_Well you know what they say Sandra, people who are terrible at one thing tend to have talent elsewhere!"_

"_That's right Jalene, let's go to the clip again for those of you just joining us."_

_The video that was shot was of relatively high quality, though the person holding the omnitool was shaking somewhat, either from laughter or excitement. Center focus was a golden stage with a massive backdrop of lights upon lights that flared up in one blinding wave before diming back to a golden yellow. The enormous crowd before the stage which must have numbered in the hundreds if not thousands all raised their hands and cheered enthusiastically as music began playing from unseen speakers. _

_As the intro played itself, the people standing on stage finally became visible as the back lights reached an acceptable level for the camera to catch more than their silhouettes. _

_Dead center on stage was the unmistakable form of Commander Shepard, and it seemed that on his left and right in a slight V formations were all the male members of the Normandy groundside team with the exception of Legion. Every single one of them was outfitted in a skin tight ruby red leather suit designed for each of their respective species. As the intro music began to die down, Garrus in his red cowl stepped forward and raised the mike in his hand before shouting to the crowd much to their delight._

"_ILLIUM! Get on your feet! Are you ready to have a good time?! Clear the front for some room, cause it's time to dance!"_

_If possible the wild crowd got even louder as the music really began to pump up and dozens of disco balls lowered from the ceilings, glittering and sending rays of light out into the throng. "Let's get started!"_

_**Give me your, give me your, give me your attention baby**_

_**I got to tell you a little something about yourself**_

_**You're wonderful, flawless, ooh you're a sexy lady**_

_**But you walk around here like you wanna be someone else**_

_**I know that you don't know it, but you're fine, so fine**_

_**Oh girl I'm gonna show you when you're mine, oh mine**_

_As Shepard sang, the entire group moved in a seemingly well-oiled motion that was a simple two step dance. They were lifting each foot together in time to the music as they made a gentle shoulder roll in rhythm to their feet's movements._

_**Treasure, that is what you are**_

_**Honey you're my golden star**_

_**And if you could make my wish come true**_

_**If you let me treasure you**_

_**If you let me treasure you**_

_Their heads bobbed and changed the direction they were facing as they moved in sync with Shepard who continued to belt out the lyrics in an amazingly clear voice, all the while leading the group in the exaggerated two step marching routine._

_**Pretty girl, pretty girl, pretty girl you should be smiling**_

_**A girl like you should never look so blue**_

_**You're everything I see in my dreams**_

_**I wouldn't say that to you if it wasn't true**_

_An asari stripped off her bra and threw it on stage which Garrus deftly caugt and wrapped around his shoulders like a strange leathery necklace._

_**I know that you don't know it, but you're fine, so fine**_

_**Oh girl I'm gonna show you when you're mine, oh mine**_

_Here Shepard pointed out to the crowd and winked, his motion mirrored by the men next to him. The women and asari in the crowd practically exploded at that small display. As the music pumped up even more, the men on stage began to add a little jumping motion to their side stepping routine, causing the crowd to scream even louder if possible._

_**Treasure, that is what you are**_

_**Honey you're my golden star**_

_**You know you can make my wish come true**_

_**If you let me treasure you**_

_**If you let me treasure you**_

_By now almost the entire crowd in front of the stage was mirroring the dancing of the men on stage. For a brief moment Shepard lowered the mike and allowed the music to play as the group began a basic choreographed four step dance, bodies swaying and rotating together in time to the dull thump of the bass. _

_**You are my treasure, you are my treasure**_

_**You are my treasure, yeah, you you you, you are**_

_**You are my treasure, you are my treasure**_

_**You are my treasure, yeah, you you you, you are**_

_As the men on stage crooned the chorus line together with Shepard, an asari near the front tried to clamber on the raised platform, but was quickly tackled and dragged away by security personal before she could reach the performers._

_**Treasure, that is what you are**_

_**Honey you're my golden star**_

_**You know you can make my wish come true**_

_**If you let me treasure you**_

_**If you let me treasure you**_

_As commander finished, he bowed to the crowd, the motion emulated by his crewmates. Giving one last award winning smile and waving to the wildly cheering mob, Shepard stepped back amid a shower of fireworks that enveloped the stage and covered the group's exit._

"_For those of you just joining us on Chasing Stars, you just witnessed Commander Shepard's latest viral video, and what a video it is! I think the question on everyone's lips is, who the lucky girl this song is dedicated to?"_

"_I don't know Sandra, the Commander's cute, but who was that turian? What a hunk! I could feel myself getting goose bumps when he took the stage, rawwwr."_

"_I do believe that was Garrus Vakarian, right hand man of Commander Shepard. He made headlines back when the commander first made it big taking down rogue spectre Saren Arterius and saving the Citadel."_

"_Well let me tell you something Sandra, I'm a six hundred and seventeen year old asari who's finally about to hit her matriarch stage, and I want to have his babies-"_

Whatever the asari talk show host was about to say was cut off from a gunshot that startled both Zaeed and Thane enough to flinch back from the destroyed public display terminal.

"Jesus, are you crazy?!" shouted Zaeed with a glare. "You nearly gave me a goddamn heart attack!"

Garrus didn't say a word but simply turned around and headed for the taxi, smoking gun still in hand. The two men by the broken terminal shared a look before wordlessly following. It was probably going to get a lot worse before it got better.

**AN: haha I don't know why I keep on picking on Bob, but I'm not done with him yet! Next up, the sniper, mercenary and assassin finally reach Fornax HQ, and the boys run into a few of their crewmates as well. Who? Well I guess you'll have to find out in the next part of this saga. Though expect some intervening stories in between. **


	14. Waking Sober III

**AN: Monday sucks, so I decided to release this early in hopes of cheering up anyone who's waiting on this story! You know who you are, so leave a review telling me how much u love me ;p**

Fornax HQ was nothing like what Garrus had imagined. For one thing, there was nothing remarkable about the building that would distinguish it from its neighbors other than the rather modest sign that proclaimed it Fornax Inc. He didn't know what he had been expecting, perhaps a phallus shaped buildings? Or at least some indication like a giant neon sign of a naked asari to proclaim that here was where porn was made. There certainly was no line of offended looking older turians protesting outside with signs as Garrus had anticipated.

Even the most liberal individuals in the galaxy wouldn't be able to bring up Fornax in conversation without some discomfort. Some things were just too taboo for polite society, and Fornax was one of them. The fact that this innocent looking building that was so similar in shape and size to everything else in the area was more disconcerting than if there was indeed a giant penis shaped building in the middle of the business district.

Interspecies pornography tended to centralize on asari doing the nasty with every other race out there and while Fornax had an extensive selection of asari erotica, the majority of their collection focused on the coupling between less familiar species. Garrus tried unsuccessfully to block out the memory of the 10 second clip between a human and an elcor he had walked in on during his time as a rookie C-Sec officer. Elcor's were apparently big everywhere. How that human managed accommodate that particularly well-endowed representation of his species inside her vaginal opening still horrified and puzzled Garrus to this day. His partner at the time had been a 179 year old asari just out of her maiden years with strange tastes in her selection of erotic films. He learned to knock on her door very quickly.

"You know, I was expecting more," said Zaeed thoughtfully as he rubbed his chin, unknowingly voicing Garrus's earlier thoughts.

"We're not here to admire the decor," snorted the turian. "Let's just go in and see the manager."

As the trio walked into the building, they noted that the reception area was rather posh, a massive marble waist high table flanked by an elaborate fountain that attempted to bring in nature to the office setting in a miniaturized form. On the table itself was a miniature tree that Zaeed identified as a bonsai tree from Earth, earning him strange looks from the drell and turian. There were some very comfortable looking waiting chairs that were designed to fit every species out there, something the Normandy desperately needed in Garrus's opinion. The lounge area was stocked with a number of the most prominent business magazines available without a single one showing the slightest bit of skin. Nothing to suggest that this was the location where the sleaziest pornography available to the galaxy was filmed at.

There was a rather plain looking asari sitting behind the reception desk, and leaning up against the marble platform was a human in a pinstriped suit. His dark hair was slicked back with a bit too much hair gel judging by the slightly slimy quality it exuded. He sported a rather weak goatee along with a pencil mustache above his upper lip, and his pinstriped suit utterly failed at trying to make him look taller. Even indoors he wore sunglasses, setting off Garrus's internal douchebag detector. Thane of course had removed his borrowed shades the minute he entered the building. It was just what polite people did.

"Hey babydoll, what say you and me hit up the Eternal Embrace this evening? I hear there was some wild performance last night, maybe I'll get lucky tonight?" the grease practically oozed out of his honeyed words.

The man's back was turned so he didn't see the way Garrus's hand twitched for his pistol at the mention of the wild perfomrance, though certainly his squad mates did. Both human and drell carefully fell behind in step, allowing the volatile turian to take the lead just in case. Better to have the gun happy vigilante in front than behind their backs once the shooting started.

"No, I'm pretty sure you won't be getting lucky tonight Tod," replied the receptionist dryly with a roll of her eyes.

"Oh is that what I said babygirl? You're just so fine I can't help but let my mind wander to the possibilities," chuckled Tod as he looked over the rim of his shades. Garru's douchebag meter completely broke at the action.

"I'm a receptionist, not one of your slutty actors!"

The man made a frantic shushing motion and darted his eyes around before breathing a sigh of relief.

"They don't like being called that honeybun. They're stars baby! Superstars!"

"Oh is that what it takes to be a star? I guess if all they have to do is be willing to bend over backwards and spread it on camera, just about anyone can be one nowadays," she snorted. "By the way, there's three rather surly looking gentleman standing behind you."

Tod turned around to face the three men, and immediately his face lit up when he spotted Garrus. Striding forward, the man snatched up Garrus's hand and pumped it enthusiastically in both of his own completely missing out on the thunderous expression on the turian's face. "Big G, my main man! How's it going fella? How's it feel to know you're going to be a megastar?!"

"I'm sorry," said Garrus slowly as he pulled his hand out of the rather insane sounding man's grip. "Who are you again?"

"HAHA good one G-man! Funny and sexy, I like that. The ladies will love it! It's me, Tod. Tod Sinep! You ever need anything, and I mean anything at all, then I'm your man."

"Right well, Tod," said Garrus uncomfortably as he unconsciously wiped the hand that had touched the man on his leg, "I need to talk to someone about a contract I might have signed with a friend last night."

"Hey, hey, hey, look no further! Tod Sinep is the man to talk to! What's going on buddy? The shooting dates wrong for you schedule? Cause we can be totally flexible about film shootings! More flexible than a horny asari!"

Ignoring the indignant "hey!" from the nameless receptionist Garrus shook his head. "No, actually I think there might have been a mistake."

"Mistake?" the fake smile on man's lips increased in its phoniness factor by tenfold. "What's going on baby? Tod can handle any problems you have! Lay it on me!"

"I need the master copies to the film I shot last night," said Garrus with hope building in his chest. Maybe his luck was finally turning around and he could avert this train wreck before it became an utter disaster. The type that ended with a lot of screaming, shouting, tears and gunshots.

"Master copy?" asked Tod slowly. "Why would you need that G man? We gave you a copy didn't we? Or do you need another one? The fine gentlemen behind you want a hard copy too? I don't blame them, when that shit hits the net it is gonna be worth its weight in gold! I can go flash up a few copies in a sec if you'd just wait down in the lobby for a tick."

"No," stated Garrus impatiently. "That film was a mistake. We were drunk out of our minds! I'm going to destroy it."

"Destroy it?!" yelped Tod. "Whoa whoa, slow down there Garr-Bear. We can talk this out baby, why you gotta go destroying a fine work of art like that?"

Leaning forward so that he could emphasize just how much bigger than the human he was, Garrus gave off a deep throated growl for good measure. "You're going to destroy it because I said so!"

The human pulled back slightly but did not appear fazed. "Well I'd love to help out G man, but you signed a contract that forked over the rights of the footage to Fornax. The corporation owns the film now, and you'd have to go take it up with the board if you want to stop production. But baby, think about what you're giving up here! Do you know how rare it is to catch footage of a quarian's face, let alone a quarian girl in action?"

The human waggles his bushy eyebrows suggestively causing Garrus's blood to boil. "If not the money, think about that sweet honey you're giving up! I'd pay good money to switch place with you buddy, cause last night? That ass you tapped was hotter than the sun! 11 out of fucking 10 that girl! I could feel myself getting hard just watching you two go at it!"

Snatching up the human by the front of his tasteless suit, the turian hauled him up into the air, leaving the man's feet dangling a good foot off the ground.

"Her name is TALI!" Garrus roared. "And if you don't want me to tear your dick off and shove it in your skull, you're going to give me the god damn fucking master tape!"

The receptionist screamed, distracting Garrus slightly from his vigorous shaking of the terrified human. He turned and caught sight of the scared asari backing up away from the melting slag of molten slush that had been her marble desk moments before. The intense glowing heat could be felt even ten paces away, and the telltale hiss of active thermite rung in their ears.

"Zaeed! What the fuck man?!" the turian shouted over the hissing noise of the burning thermite.

"What?" asked the mercenary with a careless shrug. "I figured some thermite grenades would make your threat more dramatic!"

"Hmm, it appears that the receptionist may have triggered a silent alarm before her desk melted," said Thane in his usual calm manner. The man could announce the end of the world as if he were commenting on a slight change in weather pattern.

"The fuck?" demanded Zaeed as he turned to look at the assassin. "How do you figure that?"

"I can see Illium police forces closing in on our location."

Garrus growled in annoyance and turned to look at the human he was still holding up, intent on threatening the incriminating video out of him before they had to run, but it turned out that Tod had already fainted from fear. Smelling urine, the turian glanced down at the man's crotch and snorted with disdain before carelessly dropping the passed out human to the floor. Civilians. You raise your voice a little and they think you're going to kill them.

"_This is the police! Come out with your hands in the air!"_

Garrus scoffed as he heard the familiar by the handbook line being yelled out through a megaphone. He'd said it enough times as C-sec, and in all his years spent as a field officer only one person had actually come out when they asked. That person happened to be a 400 year old krogan trying to rob a jewelry store, and he had come out with a flamethrower in hand. It had not ended well for anyone involved. Or for anyone within half a block to the crime scene for that matter.

"Well shits getting real now," grumbled Zaeed as he quickly rifled through his pocket and pulled out a dark ski mask. Pulling on the dark cloth over his head, he adjusted the eye holes so that he could see properly.

Garrus watched in bewilderment as the mercenary went about removing parts of his armor while adding on new bits and pieces from his belt pouch. Within a minute the man standing there bore no particular resemblance to Zaeed Massani other than sharing a similar armor color. And even that was changing as the mercenary began to apply grease to the exposed dark yellow plates.

"Do you always go around prepared to hide your identity from the authorities?" asked a perplexed Garrus.

"It comes with the profession," said Thane.

Turning to look at the drell, Garrus did a double take. Thane was no longer in his customary dark leather jacket and pants; instead it had all somehow been switched out with a painful snow white version the turian had to squint at. Thane was in the process of pulling on the death's mask headgear he preferred when operating in conditions with less than ideal atmosphere, but this too had somehow changed from the normal black to match the blinding white of his new outfit.

Garrus opened his mouth speechlessly for a moment, mandibles fluttering slightly as he struggled to find words. "Where the hell did you get the new clothes and when did you change?!"

Thane pulled the neck guard down all the way so that no skin was visible at all. "My clothes are reversible on the inside. It makes changing my appearance to escape easier. No one thinks twice about a green skinned drell in dark leather when the reported assassin was wearing all white. It also helps that in this outfit I look similar enough to humans and asari that most attribute me as such if they do manage to catch a glimpse of me."

Something that had been niggling in Garrus's mind finally clicked. "Wait! That was you who assassinated the politician on the Citadel 5 years ago?!"

"The asari Jolin Vou?" asked Thane with a curious cock of his head.

"Son of a bitch!" groaned Garrus. "I was sent out to investigate that case! Do you know how long they had me looking up dead end tips because of you?! Three weeks! Three fucking weeks! They told me they were relatively sure it had been a human who took the shot!"

Thane gave a throaty chuckle. "Yes I changed in a nearby public bathroom after I snuck in through a vent and left the citadel four hours later. Customs didn't even take a second look at my paperwork before I was waved through."

The turian groaned and gave the unconscious Tod a frustrated kick in the leg. "I don't believe this!"

"_Come out with your hands on your head or we will use force!"_

"Who else have you killed on the Citadel Thane?" the ex-cop demanded. "How many?"

Not waiting for an answer, the turian turned to face Zaeed. "And what about you Massani? Any other crimes you committed on the Citadel you want to fess up to?"

"You ain't got shit on me Vakarian," chuckled Zaeed as he removed the reverent machinegun from the back of his shoulder.

"Just how many people on the Normandy are law breakers here?!" demanded Garrus as he swiveled his head between his two companions.

"Well Zero's got a rap sheet that could probably cover the floor of the Normandy and still have enough left for wallpaper. Goto's a thief, enough said." Zaeed ticked off a finger with each name as he spoke.

"Samara is a justicar, and as such no doubt her sense of lawfulness has clashed with local authorities on more than one occasion as we saw with Detective Anaya," said Thane thoughtfully as he primed a predator pistol.

"Taylor and Lawson are both parts of a terrorist group, so they qualify as criminals just for that," continued Zaeed as he pulled up more fingers on the hand not holding the reverent.

"Mordin no doubt has some history of walking on the wrong side of the law as a former STG member. The salarian special task group's not exactly known for being particularly morally bound," commented Thane as he continued to check his weapons.

"_This is your last warning! Come out with your hands on your head!"_

"Grunt if you think about it is only two months old, so he don't count, though technically he was created using illegal stolen parts and tech that was traded from the collectors with slaves that we know ended up being experiments for the damn bugs," said the mercenary, casually ignoring the nervous looking police officers peering out from behind the cover of their air cars outside the clear doorway. "That just leaves you, Zorah and Shepard."

"Legion is a geth, an illegal AI by counsel space law," argued Thane.

"Oh come on, the robot?" asked Zaeed. "It's not even alive!"

"We're talking about law breaking, not debating validity of geth sentience," countered Thane.

"Uh guys?" asked Garrus as he wearily eyed the increasing number of police patrol cars joining the original two that had first arrived.

"Fine," grunted Zaeed, conceding the point. "The robots a criminal too just cause he exists. Where was I? Right, Vakarian, Zorah and Shepard."

"Garrus was a vigilante and by definition that's an individual who's taking the law into his own hands and thus ignoring the law," pointed out the drell.

"There is no law to break on Omega!" protested Garrus.

"Don't matter," laughed Zaeed, "in spirit you were a law breaker. And Shepard stole the Normandy, so even if the Alliance didn't throw him in the slammer for it that's still the mother of all joyrides."

"Oh come on! We kind of had to save the galaxy from the counsel's own incompetence!" defended Garrus.

"But he broke the law nonetheless," said Thane calmly. "As acting ship captain, his orders were followed by his crew as they should have, but his orders were not in fact lawful."

"_We will not warn you again! Lethal force has been authorized!"_

"And come on," said Zaeed as he swept the reverent in an arc to make his point, causing more than one officer outside to dive for cover. "You've seen the man in action. Sooner or later, he'll probably end up blowing up a relay or something. Ha, ten creds says it'll be in batarian space!"

Garrus rolled his eyes as Thane barked a short laugh. "No bet Zaeed, I'm not a fool."

"So in fact, the only truly clean individual on the Normandy is Tali'Zorah," the assassin pondered.

"Heh, cleans not the word I would use," chortled Zaeed. "Not after doing the nasty with Vakarian here on screen."

Garrus's mood soured as he was reminded of why they were here in the first place. He opened his mouth to make a particularly vicious comment against the mercenary warlord's sexual preference when a silver canister shattered one of the tinted windows that stared out from the lobby. The can bounced off of the lounge table and began to spew out a thick noxious plume of smoke, spinning wildly as it spilled the contents of its innards.

Another canister burst through the entryway, skipping off the floor and landing in the fountain. More of the smoke grenades began to rain in through the entrance, quickly filling the room with irritating gas.

Coughing, Garrus pulled back behind what was left of the receptionist desk, hauling the frightened asari to her feet with one arm.

"Shit! *cough* What the hell do we *cough* do?" he demanded as he tried but failed to wipe his tearing eyes clear.

"Krios, take Vakarain and the asari inside and find the goddamn tape!" shouted Zaeed. "I'll hold'em off here in the lobby!"

Thane nodded wordlessly as he grabbed the other arm of the crying asari to lead them into the building.

"Wait Zaeed!" coughed Garrus. "Don't kill anyone!"

"What do you take me for? I'm a professional! Now get the hell out of here, you're cramping my style! And get the turian a disguise or something Krios! We don't want to be IDed when this is over!"

As the elevator Thane led the group into closed, Garrus made out the blurry form of Zaeed plunging headlong through the smoke towards the entrance, gun in hand.

"HELL YEAH! COME GET SOME!"

**AN: yeah I know I promised that more of the Normandy crew would show up this chapter, but I decided to end it there because it would take too long to get where I wanted to go. So it might be a while before we run into Zaeed again, but next up we'll be seeing an unlikely pair from the Normandy. For those of you who haven't figured it out yet due to my rather amateur writing style, the Waking Sober story arc will focus mainly on Garrus desperately scrambling from one hilarious situation to another while trying to come to grips with what happened the night before. Normandy crew members will come and go, but Garrus will be in every part! Will he finally get his hands on the master copy of the porn film? Will Zaeed manage to get away from the Illium police force? Where the hell is Shepard and the others? Stay tuned to find out! Hope you guys enjoyed part 3 of Waking Sober! **


	15. Should have just gone to confession

**AN: Just moved, no internet, might be a bit slow on updates for next week or so**

Commander Shepard watched through the scope of the mantis sniper rifle as the bottle floated through the air, spinning gracefully in an arc from Garrus's exaggerated javelin throw. Time seemed to slow down as the canister danced gracefully through empty space. The labeling on the back becoming visible enough for Shepard to read as his enhanced reflexes slowed the world. His instincts screamed at him to pull the trigger as he lined up the perfect shot, but his digit hesitated for a brief moment.

Though this was taking place over the matter of a heartbeat, the commander's honed mind had enough time to process his decision. Feeling his lip quirk, he watched the bottle fall past the arc for the best shot possible, before finally reaching the point of no return where a hit was impossible. He pulled the trigger anyways knowing he would miss, and miss he did.

"I'm Garrus Vakarian, and this is my new favorite spot on the citadel!" crowed the commander's turian companion in a parody of his own endorsement to the many citadel shops he had visited.

With both fists raised in the air in a victorious display, Garrus picked up his own rifle and stroked the length of the deadly weapon with mock loving care.

"I think I'm gonna have this gun bronzed, and maybe put up a statue of myself here," continued the turian as he let his eyes sweep majestically over the area as if looking for the perfect spot for his sculpture.

"There was a crosswind," retorted Lion of Elysium with a playful laugh. "Best two out of three?"

"No need John, I think today we've finally proven who the better shot is. I mean there really wasn't ever really a question about it in my mind, but I wanted to humor you so you wouldn't have to live life with that feeling of uncertainty hanging over your head."

Chuckling, the commander shook his head and wandered over to the gun case Garrus had brought out of the trunk of the air car they had flown up to the top of the presidium.

"Those cans actually have beer in them or are we just gonna stand here and watch the cars pass?" asked Shepard as he picked out a levo brand and weighed it thoughtfully in his hands.

Garrus joined the commander and picked out his own selection. "You know me Shepard, always prepared."

The two friends clinked their cans together and leaned up against the back of the air car as they sipped their respective drinks while watching the traffic pass by. The silence between them was a comfortable one, the type that fell between two comrades who had walked through hell together and helped each other limp away from the kinds of battlefields most did not get to leave.

They passed the time talking about past battles and bullshitting each other over who had saved whose ass more often. After a while the hush returned and the two finished their beers in companionable silence.

"Shepard," said Garrus softly as he crushed his empty can and let it fall to his feet. "There's something I want to tell you."

Turning to face his friend the commander smiled and gestured with his own can which he had yet to drain. "There's no need Garrus, I feel the same way."

"What?" asked the perplexed turian.

"You're the best friend a guy could have. Like the brother I've never had," Shepard replied solemnly. "I'm glad you feel the same way."

Garrus scratched at his face with a talon, a nervous tick of his for as long as the human had known him. "I do Shepard, believe me, I do. But that wasn't what I wanted to tell you."

The bewildered expression had now infected the commander's face, but his incomprehension morphed quickly into surprise after a moment of staring.

"oh…OH. Uh well…I mean that's uh…I mean that's great man. I mean I'd feel similar too, but I'm still with Miranda."

"Wait what?" Turians were not particularly expressive with their faces given their metallic plating covering most their body, but Garrus seemed to have the confused puzzlement one down pretty well.

"I mean I don't have any problems with it you know. I've got plenty of gay friends who like males of other species."

"…What?"

The commander was looking slightly uncomfortable as he emptied his beer can with two loud exaggerated gulps. "I just don't feel that way about you Garrus, I'm sorry."

"John you're making no sense. What don't you feel about me?"

"I mean I'm not gay," clarified Shepard, his discomfort becoming more pronounced by the moment.

The turian stared for a moment more before it clicked. Peals of laughter broke out across the top of the bridge, carried on by the winds caused by the passing air cars to the ground below.

"Spirits! You thought I was confessing to you?!"

Shepard had joined in with the laughter as he realized the massive faux pa he had committed. Wiping a tear from his eyes he joined Garrus in sitting down on the floor.

"What was I supposed to think? I mean that's what my mind jumped to when you said you had something to tell me with that serious expression!"

The two friends continued to laugh, basking in the moment of peace between them. It was a nice break from the darkness of the war that had claimed so many lives already.

"Seriously? 'I have a lot of gay friends who like guys from other species'?" asked Garrus with a raised brow plate. "Who pray tell, do you know who likes males of other species? Please tell me it's not Grunt. He always gave me funny looks in the shower."

The commander rolled his eyes. "I was pulling shit out of my ass."

The two friends shared another quiet chuckle as they hauled each other to their feet.

"So what did you want to tell me?" asked the commander as their merriment finally settled.

The laughter left the turian's face and his body language visibly tensed up. Scratching at the reminder of the close brush with death he had had on Omega, Garrus looked away from his friend before speaking in a low shamed tone.

"I…I might have slept with Tali."

The turian winced internally at the silence coming from his best friend. When he finally worked up the courage to face the commander it was not the apocalyptic look of fury he had expected and been prepared for.

Garrus had gotten pretty adept at reading human emotions with the time he had spent amongst them, but this one was particularly complicated as the patterns he had come to recognize were seemingly mixed together from various displays of emotions he had become familiar with.

"I guess I shouldn't be surprised," Shepard said with a rueful shake of his head. "I can't help but still think of Tali as the young lost pilgrim we rescued from the alleyway behind Chora's den, but she's an admiral now."

Heaving a sigh the commander smiled sadly at the turian. "She'll always be my baby sister you know? But you're my best friend, and I can't think of anyone else better for her. You're both adults, and a consenting act of affection is well within your rights. I'm really happy for you two."

Seeing the look of discomfort grow on Garrus's face, John narrowed his eyes in suspicious. "It was consented right?"

The turian scratched at the old injury again, causing a scowl to form on the human's face. "Garrus?"

"We uh…we might have been drunk."

John eased up his scowl into a frown, feeling a tight protective anger build in his chest. His left hand clenched into a fist reflexively while his right twitched for the paladin at his side, something that was not lost of Garrus. Taking a deep calming breath, John exhaled before speaking again.

"Well shit Garrus, mistakes happen. You did tell her right?"

"Of course I did!"

Nodding tightly, John noted that Garrus still looked nervous. His three fingered hand twitched spastically as if it itched to reach for the side of his face.

"Ok, so what aren't you telling me Garrus?"

"What? What makes you think I haven't told you everything?"

"The way you're trying to scratch your face right now. You always do that when you're nervous."

Lowering his hand quickly, Garrus gave a sigh of defeat. There was no way around it.

"WeMightHaveShotAVideoOfItAtFornax."

The commander blinked than burst out laughing. "You're going to have to say that again Garrus, I think the translator glitched out on me there. It told me you said you guys shot a film together at Fornax!"

Seeing the way Garrus was avoiding his gaze, the commander felt the muscle in his jaw clench involuntarily into a painful grimace. "Garrus?"

The turian unconsciously reached up and scratched at his face again. "It wasn't a glitch John."

Garrus turned to face he commander fully for the first time since his attempted confession. "You remember the night after we finally got back to civilization after we blew up the collector base? Tali and I were drunk out of our minds and ended up shooting a video at Fornax."

"So there's a sex tape of you two floating on the extranet?" demanded the commander, his expression eerily neutral. It was the same look he got right before he pulled the trigger on a target; one Garrus was intimately familiar with.

"What? No I've taken care of that," replied the turian hastily. "I made sure the master copy was destroyed and that nothing was ever uploaded!"

John nodded slowly as he locked eyes with Garrus. Reaching out, he placed a hand firmly on the armored turian's shoulder, the iron grip felt even through the thick reinforced plating.

"You've been a good friend Garrus," John said somberly, his hand tightening further if possible.

Giving a shaky smile, Garrus chuckled uneasily. "Enough for you to forgive me?"

"_And in other news today, there had been an incident above the presidium walkway involving Commander Shepard and Garrus Vakarian. Surveillance footage over the scene showed the two men sharing drinks and laughs over an arching bridge in the upper levels of the presidium just moments before Commander Shepard grabs Garrus Vakarian by the armor and throwing him over the bridge."_

"_That's right Trisha, luckily some good Samaritan bystanders were on hand to dive into the pool to give the struggling turian a hand, though there were reports that Commander Shepard had opened fire on his friend with his sidearm! It really makes you wonder what was said between the two of them doesn't it?"_

"_Indeed, but some things will have to remain a mystery I suppose as both men were rather tight lipped about what took place between them. Garrus Vakarian has issued a statement that he will not be pressing charges against the Commander despite being shot three times. He was rushed to Huerta Memorial for treatment immediately and was discharged two hours later."_


End file.
